Daryl Hall looks like a lion.

December 12, 2008 2:09 PM

I think that we can all agree that the best-selling duo in rock history, Hall & Oates, are pretty freaking awesome. They recorded some of the greatest songs in pop history, including "Rich Girl", "Kiss on My List", "Private Eyes", "I Can't Go for That (No Can Do)", "Maneater", and "You Make My Dreams Come True". They were incredible live. And they participated in the greatest back-alley song-writing duel of 1978. Also Daryl Hall considers himself a modern-day warlock. However, last night the world learned that Hall and Oates's are sad. They are extremely saddened by the upcoming departure of Alan Colmes from his show Hannity and Colmes, and they have chosen to express their sadness through song.

Sean Hannity actually replied to Hall & Oates's heartfelt tribute to the departure of his colleague, stating “I was actually thinking of Jon [Stewart] as a co-host but I needed someone who could be smart and funny without 50 writers and two has-been rockers who are badly in need of Botox.” via.

posted by ND¢ (88 comments total)

Yes, yes. Of course, Sean Hannity will need those fifty writers and that Botox alll for himself. I haven't looked at Hall or Oates' pucker, but I bet Hannity's got dibs on some anal bleaching creme too.
posted by boo_radley at 2:18 PM on December 12, 2008

Hall & Oates, are pretty freaking awesome

As it is written, so it shall be.

COSIGNED
posted by Potomac Avenue at 2:20 PM on December 12, 2008 [3 favorites]

Wow, cool.

I saw them at the Univ of Ariz in Tucson around 1983. I was working there and someone knew someone who gave us back stage passes. It was a bizarre. If I remember correctly there was no band on stage, just the two of them with canned music? They were intensely weird in person and though I do not own a single mp3, I will never forget that experience.

Thanks.

H
posted by silsurf at 2:21 PM on December 12, 2008

Also: from Flute of the Commodores.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 2:23 PM on December 12, 2008

...Hall & Oates, are pretty freaking awesome.

No can do.
posted by punkfloyd at 2:23 PM on December 12, 2008 [3 favorites]

Those dudes look DAMN good for a couple of guys in their 60s - Botox or not.

Oh, and fuck Sean Hannity. Not for anything in particular, but just because this seemed like a reasonably good time to say that.
posted by deadmessenger at 2:25 PM on December 12, 2008 [2 favorites]

"Welcome to the song-writing contest between Hall and Oates, and Loggins and MacDonald"
posted by KokuRyu at 2:26 PM on December 12, 2008

They got their facial hair backwards.
posted by oddman at 2:26 PM on December 12, 2008 [6 favorites]

I love the Nord Lead sound on "I Can't Go For That". So warm.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 2:26 PM on December 12, 2008

One of the (I presume) singular joys of getting older is watching the hip kids, at first ironically, pay homage to the sort of pop artists I loved as a kid and then was rapidly shamed into pretending to dislike as I hit adolescence full-bore (pun intended) only to see some of the same hip kids hop onto the bandwagon and reluctantly grant said groups their pop bona fides.

I suppose the second joy of getting older is writing run-on sentences and not giving a fuck.

*sits smiling patiently waiting for jonmc to tell us that H&O are terrible*
posted by joe lisboa at 2:27 PM on December 12, 2008

Don't forget their 80s-awesomeness version of Jingle Bell Rock.
posted by amyms at 2:27 PM on December 12, 2008 [1 favorite]

when i met Sean Hannity in 2005 i had a really strong sense of deja vu; like i had experienced his douchebageosity sometime before. well, i found out recently that he was an undergrad at NYU at the same time as me and we even shared the same professor --renowned Marxist, Bertell Ollman.

if he indeed was the same guy in Ollman's class who never shut the fuck up about Reagan and said that anybody who was a marxist deserved to be treated as a traitor to the state, then dude, Sean Hannity was in my PoliSci class back in the 1980s and he was as big an asshole then.
posted by liza at 2:29 PM on December 12, 2008 [34 favorites]

"Pretty freaking awesome" may be a stretch. But their accomplishments are worthy of more respect than their uncoolness usually affords them.
posted by Joe Beese at 2:29 PM on December 12, 2008

Oh, hell, no. No, no, no, no, no.
posted by everichon at 2:30 PM on December 12, 2008

"They are extremely saddened by the upcoming departure of Alan Colmes from his show Hannity and Colmes, and they have chosen to express their sadness through" BUFFERING . . .
posted by majick at 2:32 PM on December 12, 2008

I work with a lot of very smart, very young (compared to me) people, and a few years back, one of the smartest (and most accomplished, in addition to being a technologist he's about to release his 3rd album and has toured the world) thought we'd made up "Hall & Oats" just to f*ck with him, which immediately resulted in 3 weeks of their greatest hits album in heavy rotation on the office soundtrack. Which I guess just proves there's book smarts and other "smarts" that don't always overlap.

"but I needed someone who could be smart and funny without 50 writers"

Fair enough, but A: implying that Colmes was smart and funny is stretching things, at least a bit, and B: I don't see how being stupid and unfunny with no writer is something Sean should be particularly proud of.

*sits smiling patiently waiting for jonmc to tell us that H&O are terrible*

Not exactly - jonmc will praise the early "Philly Soul" sound stuff, talk about how the later stuff blew goats, and drop five names of other Philly Soul sound musicians we should be aware of even though no one's ever heard of them.
posted by jalexei at 2:32 PM on December 12, 2008 [1 favorite]

Hall and Oates have a solid repertoire and are always often a pleasant surprise on the radio or MP3 player shuffle. I wouldn't call them a guilty pleasure, they're more of a "shit, I didn't know I liked that many song them" artist. But calling them awesome? I can't go for that, no can do.
posted by Slack-a-gogo at 2:34 PM on December 12, 2008 [1 favorite]

I never gave them a second thought back in their heyday. A friend began doing some tech work for Daryl's web show a while back, so I started checking it out and gained a whole new respect for him. There is some pretty cool stuff in the archive, particularly the Monte Montgomery episode.
posted by gimli at 2:36 PM on December 12, 2008

Well, now I know how it feels to piss in somebody else's thread. It's like... I want those precious seconds that I lost clicking on the links back. But I cannot have them back... So:

Zzzzip...

...Aaah.
posted by Laotic at 2:38 PM on December 12, 2008

I think that we can all agree that the best-selling duo in rock history, Hall & Oates, are pretty freaking awesome.

THE FUCK WE CAN'T. I'd rather drip boiling syrup into my ears and punch myself in the junk with a kilo brick of Peruvian flake until thoroughly dead.

Yacht Rock does a much better job at mocking these smooth-jam nose-hair farmers than I ever will.


Oh, fuck. Is Boards of Canada my generations Hall & Oates? In twenty years will the hipster kids be listening to it ironically while smoking ironic blunts? OH SHIT NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
posted by loquacious at 2:38 PM on December 12, 2008 [6 favorites]

Only recently have I heard Private Eyes, and much of the song gets stuck in my head with some regularity now. (Listening to it 30 times in one day probably set that off, but it's just so catchy!)

Sean Hannity is a tool. The end.

(OK, to elaborate: how many writers does John Stewart have? And how many does Hannity rely on? And did you know he has an online dating site, called Hannidate?)
posted by filthy light thief at 2:39 PM on December 12, 2008

Well, according to ... cough .... Dickipedia:

Sean Hannity .... dropped out of NYU once he realized they taught real subjects there and “Jesus” wasn’t an acceptable answer to every other question.
posted by R. Mutt at 2:39 PM on December 12, 2008 [1 favorite]

Batshitinsane tag?
posted by cmoj at 2:41 PM on December 12, 2008

I'm glad I don't have to pretend to be too cool for Hall & Oates! Thanks for the post; I'm getting some enjoyable '80s flashback.
posted by languagehat at 2:41 PM on December 12, 2008 [1 favorite]

Oh, right. Yacht Rock is already linked in the post. Damnit.
posted by loquacious at 2:42 PM on December 12, 2008

jalexei: jonmc will praise the early "Philly Soul" sound stuff, talk about how the later stuff blew goats, and drop five names of other Philly Soul sound musicians we should be aware of even though no one's ever heard of them.

Actually, my money says he'll refer to Hall's ripping vocals on Robert Fripp's "You Burn Me Up I'm a Cigarette". Or maybe mention that they do the best cover ever of a Mike Oldfield song.
posted by Slack-a-gogo at 2:46 PM on December 12, 2008

So, nobody's going to mention that the actual performance could have used another rehearsal or two? *ducks*
posted by queensissy at 2:46 PM on December 12, 2008

Speaking of Botox and "Jingle Bell Rock"...
posted by Smart Dalek at 2:46 PM on December 12, 2008

Metafilter - Tired of you California vagina sailors stabbing the American airwaves in the dick with your shit music.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 2:52 PM on December 12, 2008 [2 favorites]

queensissy - I started typing "I wish they rehearsed the song a few more time", got sidetracked, and somehow forgot to finish the thought. I agree totally. I wouldn't be surprised if that the first time the actually went through the song together.
posted by Slack-a-gogo at 2:52 PM on December 12, 2008 [1 favorite]

Ah, Slack-a-gogo, I still have that Fripp LP, although I haven't played it for years. And holy crap, I'm remembering more and more of this song as I listen to it on YouTube. North Star is pretty sweet, too.
posted by maudlin at 3:03 PM on December 12, 2008

BOC (not Blue Oyster Cult!) aren't mainstream in any sense of the word. A quick bit on the love of H&O, nicked from wikipedia: much of the duo's reputation is due to its sustained pop-chart run in the 1980s.... Boards of Canada, while loved by a variety of people, their biggest claim to fame would be appearances as TV soundtracks or maybe in adverts (I'm sure I've heard them on TV somewhere).
posted by filthy light thief at 3:03 PM on December 12, 2008

God, I hope my coworkers forgive me occasionally mumbling "...and I'm outta my HEAD when you're NOTAAAAROUUUUUND" under my breath for the next four hours. Damn you, ND¢ .
posted by fairytale of los angeles at 3:07 PM on December 12, 2008 [1 favorite]

I think that we can all agree that the best-selling duo in rock history, Hall & Oates, are pretty freaking awesome.

No, no we can not.
posted by caddis at 3:07 PM on December 12, 2008

Oh, fuck. Is Boards of Canada my generations Hall & Oates?

Not unless my Mom's listening to them, and I'm pretty sure she isn't.
posted by jalexei at 3:11 PM on December 12, 2008

Yacht Rock does a much better job at mocking these smooth-jam nose-hair farmers than I ever will.

JD Ryznar, Yacht Rock creator, is a big fan of all the music used in the show (well, except probably Jimmy Buffet in episode 11), which is the main reason why it's so good. When parody comes from a place of pure hate, it tends to suck. In fact, the whole second episode (the backalley songwriting duel) came about because he had been wanting to use the H&O song "Portable Radio" in something for a long time. Compiling a soundtrack of all the songs on the show is difficult, because a few songs are off obscure out-of-print Loggins/McDonald/Hall & Oates vinyl from his own collection.
posted by DecemberBoy at 3:11 PM on December 12, 2008 [2 favorites]

H&O have just released a new CD/DVD (Blu-ray) Live at the Troubador (clip).

John has released a new solo album 1000 Miles of Life (with performances from Blues Travelers John Popper, Bela Fleck, Blind Boys of Alabama, Steve Cropper, Bonnie and Bekka Bramlett and others) and Daryl is about to post his 14th. webcast on his Live From Daryl's House website [previously on MeFi].
posted by ericb at 3:15 PM on December 12, 2008

Let's get one thing straight, hipsters: Hall & Oates are not Yacht Rock.
posted by oncogenesis at 3:17 PM on December 12, 2008

*sits smiling patiently waiting for jonmc to tell us that H&O are terrible*

You might be surprised.

"This is cool. Daryl hall is a good blue-eyed soul singer ('Rich Girl' and 'Sara Smile') are gems and his solo work, especially 'Dreamtime,' is some suprisingly rockin' Beatlesque power pop.

-- posted by jonmc at 8:25 PM on August 23

posted by ericb at 3:45 PM on December 12, 2008

for some reason this reminds me of a story

my cousin, who is only now in her early thirties, looked blankly at me, oh, about 12 or 15 years ago, maybe more, and said "who's Deep Purple?" after I came home from their first rock concert in New Delhi (and probably only rock concert in New Delhi)

i knew the lead singer of the local band that opened for them and had front row seats
posted by infini at 3:50 PM on December 12, 2008

I do like Hall and Oates, even the music they wrote for other musicians. Why is Sean Hannity raging against them? Why? What's his problem? He and Brit Hume, I swear. Both have always been insufferable, but now that the Democrats have Congress and the White House, it's like they're in Mean Drunk Mode. There's gonna be a lot more chair-throwing, mic-cutting, pencil-breaking and swearing during interviews from both of these guys.

Oh, fuck. Is Boards of Canada my generations Hall & Oates?

I'd nominate Pharrell Williams.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 3:56 PM on December 12, 2008

once I asked one of my fellow editors a question about Joyce Carol Oates....she lookd up from her desk and asked "You mean from Hall and Oates?"
posted by timsteil at 3:56 PM on December 12, 2008 [4 favorites]

Slack-a-gogo, I was going to bring up that Fripp Album "Exposure". I have a copy on vinyl here. While "You Burn Me Up I'm A Cigarette" is a good punk song, I really appreciate Daryl Hall's singing on "North Star". Fripp can get some pretty great musicians to work with, that's for sure. I wan't a fan of Hall and Oates in their day, but "Exposure" made me take a look at Daryl Hall with some respect.

Way back when, when I used to read Rolling Stone, there was an article which was about one of the two, I don't remember if it was H or O, but one thing that came up was how much of a primadonna he was. They sat at a table, and there was a pitcher of water and an empty glass in front of him. He stared longingly at the glass until his assistant poured him a glass and handed it to him. Now that's an ego.
posted by Eekacat at 3:56 PM on December 12, 2008

Why is Sean Hannity raging against them? Why? What's his problem?

Ummm he's a huge peckerhead and a tool?
posted by Eekacat at 3:58 PM on December 12, 2008

Oh wait, that was a rhetorical question.
posted by Eekacat at 3:59 PM on December 12, 2008

"He was the Tango to his Cash" was beautiful.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 4:03 PM on December 12, 2008

That Daily Show montage of Colmes-abuse clips really demonstrates in spades what seems to be a fundamental conservative tenet: What that guy says is correct, because he's a bully.
posted by Flunkie at 4:11 PM on December 12, 2008 [2 favorites]

Let's get one thing straight, hipsters: Hall & Oates are not Yacht Rock.

True, they were put in the show to be an antagonist to the actual Yacht Rockers (and as an excuse to use "Portable Radio") and actually did have some disdain for the west coast smooth music scene in real life, but the people that have gone on to make Yacht Rock into an actual rock subgenre and have put together bins of vinyl marked "Yacht Rock" at record stores and Yacht Rock DJ sets and radio shows and so forth have decided that they are, so now they are.
posted by DecemberBoy at 4:14 PM on December 12, 2008

*sits smiling patiently waiting for jonmc to tell us that H&O are terrible*

I actually like some of their early stuff. "Rich Girl" and "Sara Smile" are terrific. And "Dreamtime" from one of Hall's solo records is damned good.
posted by jonmc at 4:42 PM on December 12, 2008 [2 favorites]

The Pitchfork interview with Daryl Hall was revealing. I never expected that of all the names Hall would evoke in terms of influences, "Alistair Crowley" would be one of them.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 4:44 PM on December 12, 2008

I wasn't really aware of this Colmes guy until last night but that flashlight-in-the-face crap really made me feel sorry for him. I'm surprised he lasted as long as he did.
posted by A dead Quaker at 4:57 PM on December 12, 2008

Hey cool! Someone put "North Star" on youtube! Not the best sound quality, but you get the idea.
posted by Eekacat at 5:22 PM on December 12, 2008

I didn't much like Hall and Oates, but She's Gone was awesome. Even better than the Tavares cover, which was pretty awesome as well.

drop five names of other Philly Soul sound musicians we should be aware of even though no one's ever heard of them.

He'd best be starting with the Ojays or some early Harold Melvin.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 5:26 PM on December 12, 2008

Hall & Oates-ugh. Never liked their stuff. Booooorrrriiiinggggg.


(But I shouldn't talk, I had every album Elton John put out at one time.)
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 5:28 PM on December 12, 2008

This is totally off topic, but that Robert Fripp Album has a beautiful version of one of my favorite Peter Gabriel songs "Here Comes the Flood." It's produced in a much more spare style, and really gives the song so much more power. Tagged on is some Frippertronics, "Water Music".
posted by Eekacat at 5:33 PM on December 12, 2008

I'm a fan.

For whatever reason one of my most powerful memories of my, uh, tween years was hearing Maneater for the first time while playing Donkey Kong Jr. and drinking a slurpee in the front of the K-Mart in Milford, Massachusetts while my mother waited in the check out line. It was great.
posted by dirtdirt at 5:36 PM on December 12, 2008 [3 favorites]

I don't think of Hall & Oates as only of the 1980s. "Sara Smile" and "Rich Girl" were big, constantly played hits in 1976-'77.

"Maneater" and other '80s songs aren't up to that level, are repetitive, etc. (although their cover of "You've Lost that Lovin' Feeling" was great), but they're nowhere bear the level of ridiculousness as fellow '70s hitmaker Steve Miller's "Abracadabra" ("I wanna reach out and grab ya."). Hall wrote Paul Young's "Every Time You Go Away," besides, which gives him a pass for writing "Maneater," and more especially the "woman is wild, oooo" thing at the end. Holy god, that song was catchy. I can still remember most of the words. Hall & Oates sing the song Young covered on the unfortunately titled "Live at the Apollo" with David Ruffin and Eddie Kendrick of the Temps. Good stuff. I remember listening to it in the '80s. It's on all the music services, iTunes, Rhapsody, etc.

There is also, by the way, a Haulin' Oats out there.
posted by raysmj at 6:08 PM on December 12, 2008

Uh... I took "I think we can all agree" as a lovely, ironic tease set up to remind us that even though we think we hate H&O, we are actually happy hum along when they show up on the car radio or in the pub run by actual English people who have horrible taste in American pop music.

Supporting evidence: "Sean Hannity actually replied to Hall & Oates's heartfelt tribute to the departure of his colleague."

ND¢'s tone was the whole reason I clicked through.
posted by Lesser Shrew at 6:15 PM on December 12, 2008

I only smile when I lie, then I'll tell you why.
posted by not_on_display at 6:30 PM on December 12, 2008 [2 favorites]

I think we can all agree,
that nothing will be agreed on.
Show me a thousand opinions,
they'll each be somehow peed on.
We do not fly in formation,
as if we were migrating ducks.
Still, I think we can all agree,
your favorite band, indeed, sucks.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 6:31 PM on December 12, 2008 [3 favorites]

Okay, I'll admit it -- and I'm not at all ashamed to -- when iTuned first went live wit the music store, my first three purchases were Lowdown (Boz Skaggs), I Can't Go For That & Maneater. Suck on it, haters.
posted by Devils Rancher at 6:58 PM on December 12, 2008

heh.... you kids...
posted by HuronBob at 7:06 PM on December 12, 2008

I actually like some of their early stuff. "Rich Girl" and "Sara Smile" are terrific. And "Dreamtime" from one of Hall's solo records is damned good.

I was just baitin' ya. I'll check out "Dreamtime."
posted by joe lisboa at 7:44 PM on December 12, 2008

Well hot damn I made an off handed reference to Hall & Oates here and got slapped down here. So I guess the question is re:Hall & Oates - Is it safe?
posted by pianomover at 7:56 PM on December 12, 2008

Oh man oh man they're just the greatest. Best Hall and Oates song hands down: "You're Much too Soon". War Babies is solid throughout, and Todd Rundgren, like always, brings it home with his space guitar.
posted by Jeff_Larson at 8:01 PM on December 12, 2008

Oh and Harold Melvin wasn't good until "Where are all my Friends". So there.
posted by Jeff_Larson at 8:04 PM on December 12, 2008

When my parents would take me and my sister to Disneyland in the late 80s and early 90s, the 5 hour car ride was mostly H&O. I can remember laying in the back seat of our Ford Aerostar minivan and listening to Rich Girl.
posted by SirOmega at 8:37 PM on December 12, 2008

I think that we can all agree that the best-selling duo in rock history, Hall & Oates, are pretty freaking awesome.

Fascinating. I'd disagree with that entirely, not because of Hall & Oates specifically, but in my experience, having groups of people agree that a particular band is awesome is something science will never solve.
posted by juiceCake at 8:48 PM on December 12, 2008

I think that we can all agree that the best-selling duo in rock history, Hall & Oates, are pretty freaking awesome.

Sorry, I always switched stations whenever I heard it.
posted by bonobothegreat at 9:12 PM on December 12, 2008

Jon Stewart "needs" 50 writers to be funny?

Jon Stewart, all by himself, using only the first half of the alphabet, could still expose Hannity for the tool he is, and have the audience falling out of their chairs laughing.

Hannity, with the combined writing staff of The Daily Show, The Colbert Report and Your Show of Shows, couldn't coax a chuckle out of any given conscious human. Well, not intentionally, anyway.
posted by PlusDistance at 9:28 PM on December 12, 2008 [1 favorite]

Hall & Oates may not be cool but at least they are upstanding God-fearing folks. Not like Sean Hannity who sings songs about the Devil. (Venue.)
posted by twoleftfeet at 9:38 PM on December 12, 2008

Hannity makes O'Reilly seem calm, rational, balanced, and centrist.
posted by Burhanistan at 9:46 PM on December 12, 2008 [1 favorite]

Let me just say that the original, non-parodied-up version of "She's Gone" is my all-time favorite song by H&O (I bought it the FIRST time it was released, so there), AND WILL ALWAYS REMAIN SO IN SPITE OF WHAT THEY DID TO IT JUST NOW. Not that their later stuff wasn't good, but it seemed like every new album after that was just a half-step below the last one, with the exception of the off-the-wall-but awesome Big Bam Boom album which was great for an entirely different set of reasons.

Also, their official pre-MTV video of that song is indeed the greatest half-assed phoning-it-in lip-sync performance in the history of Rock & Roll.
posted by wendell at 10:03 PM on December 12, 2008

I think we can all agree,
that nothing will be agreed on.
Show me a thousand opinions,
they'll each be somehow peed on.
We do not fly in formation,
as if we were migrating ducks.
Still, I think we can all agree,
your favorite band, indeed, sucks.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 8:31 PM on December 12

I think we can all agree that comment rocked.
posted by Ynoxas at 10:39 PM on December 12, 2008

Also, I have stated several times that if I could magically make my singing voice sound like anyone in the world it would be Daryl Hall.

I actually feel sorrow for people who have such incredibly fragile egos paired with meticulously crafted personas that they can't even allow themselves, or anyone else, to simply enjoy a fucking pop song without going into faux hysterics.

It's embarrassing.
posted by Ynoxas at 10:50 PM on December 12, 2008

Wow, She's Gone is one of the first songs I remember hearing as a small child and thinking "What a great singer!" and that singer was Daryl Hall. The part where he's all, "Now I can see her taking her toll on me..." gave me shivers. What a way to deal with the pain of his divorce, by creating a stone pop/r&b classic.

I read years and years ago that Hall was into that Crowley stuff, but it seems more like New Age-y "create your own magick" than actual Satanism.

Daryl's 1977 solo album, Sacred Songs, is awesome. The bridge of Something in 4/4 Time has some guitar business that wouldn't be out of place on a Cut Copy, Deerhoof, or, yes, a Boards of Canada album today. But that's probably more due to Fripp's influence than Hall's. I wish he'd gone further in that direction. There's very few experimental musicians blessed with voices like his that I know of.
posted by droplet at 12:49 AM on December 13, 2008

Sacred Songs caused some difficulty with the label, who refused to release it at first, I think - the original idea was that Sacred Songs, Exposure and Peter Gabriel II (which Fripp also produced) were to be seen as a sort of trilogy, but the Gabriel came out while the other two were delayed. In fact, Hall was supposed to be the singer on a number of other songs on Exposure, but label interference meant that those songs had to be rerecorded with other vocalists. Those takes have been included with the recent remastered edition

Exposure is an extraordinary album, by the way, leaping from genre to genre, via protosampling (one track is a real family argument set to a heavy groove) and other oddness. In 1979 there was nothing quite like it.
posted by Grangousier at 3:17 AM on December 13, 2008

Daryl Hall is indeed a warlock! See how he concealed evil messages within the magical spell of letters in "Hall and Oates". They also spell "atonal has led", "the nasal lode", "old satan, heal", and "ah, oldest anal!"
posted by twoleftfeet at 4:44 AM on December 13, 2008

I'll never forgive Hall & Oates for not having time to play "Private Eyes" when I saw them in concert 13 years ago, but somehow having plenty of time to play an obscure ballad from a Daryl Hall solo project. There should have been some sort of democratic process in place where the audience was allowed to vote on which of the two we'd prefer.
posted by The Gooch at 6:06 AM on December 13, 2008

When "Rich Girl" was a hit I was shocked at the audacity of "it's a bitch, girl."

But I shouldn't talk, I had every album Elton John put out at one time.

His '70s albums are pretty great.
posted by kirkaracha at 8:52 AM on December 13, 2008 [1 favorite]

No love for "Adult Education"?
posted by stinkycheese at 9:12 AM on December 13, 2008

I feel like a few weeks ago on Weekend Update they had actors-as-Hall-and-Oates doing a similar shtick? So did SNL parody The Daily Show (I don't know the timing here) or did the Daily Show get Hall and Oates to actualize a parody show? Or is there some other earlier reference point that both are responses to?
posted by stevil at 10:42 AM on December 13, 2008

A friend has a Hall and Oates karaoke cover group. They call themselves Foyer and Wheat.
posted by Jawn at 12:04 PM on December 13, 2008 [3 favorites]

Hall and Oates were my first concert. A friends sister won tickets and couldn't find anyone to go with her. Til Tuesday opened. I'm not ashamed to say that I still listen to both bands.
posted by Sailormom at 6:16 PM on December 13, 2008

The singer in my band is actually a relatively good friend of Daryl Hall's. He turned down a gig touring with Hall as a backup singer for him a few years ago, (Hall called him personally to offer him the gig, on a recommendation) and they've talked regularly, since. He showed Daryl the town during SXSW a couple years ago -- they hung out together most of the week -- & from everything I've heard from him, he's a really down-to-earth, normal not-egotistc person. This guy in my band, the best singer I've ever had the privilege to work with, said he learned to sing from Hall & Oates records as a teenager -- That's all the endorsement I need.

And what the hell is wrong with a well-crafted pop song? Mozart rocks, Miles Davis rocks -- there's tons of music-as-high-art to appreciate in the world, and there's also the simple craftsmanship of an intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus, coda, 3.5 minutes and out. Just the intro to I Can't Go For That unfolds like a flower before the verse even starts. It's exceedingly well crafted, recorded and produced. One does not have to like one form to the exclusion of all others.
posted by Devils Rancher at 6:39 PM on December 13, 2008 [1 favorite]

But I shouldn't talk, I had every album Elton John put out at one time.)
--posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies

Go ahead, talk. If Goodbye Yellow Brick Road had been a single album, it would have been one of the 10 best albums of the decade. Love Lies Bleeding has one of the most incredible bass tracks ever recorded. Danny Bailey. Grey Seal. Harmony. I've Seen That Movie, Too. This Song Has No Title. All stunningly good. His band in those days was A-list, for sure. All of Tumblweed Connection is masterful. Not a wrong note. Come Down in Time is just sublime.


This is totally off topic, but that Robert Fripp Album has a beautiful version of one of my favorite Peter Gabriel songs "Here Comes the Flood." It's produced in a much more spare style, and really gives the song so much more power.
--posted by Eekacat

Yes. This. I have wept upon occasion at this recording. Haunting, and utterly note-perfect, compared to the tone-deaf production it received from Bob Ezrin on his first solo album.
posted by Devils Rancher at 6:53 PM on December 13, 2008 [1 favorite]

Thanks Grangousier! I remembered Sacred Songs and Exposure were 2/3rds of a trilogy but couldn't for the life of me remember what the 3rd album was. I really should find that Peter Gabriel album and give it a listen.
posted by reidfleming at 8:13 PM on December 13, 2008

Over half of my normal listening rotation is American & European free jazz. But I can still get weak over Sara Smile and She's Gone. Hall's voice can just do that. I never unduly exposed my children to them--Christ other than Exposure and Sacred Songs, I never owned a Hall (or Oates) recording. But if they were on the radio, sure.

Hannity doesn't need to employ writers, at least not in the last 12 years or so as he's had the Karl Rove Laugh Factory writing his talking points daily. Now that Rove too works for Ailes (or did he always?) he may have to hire some writers. Maybe that's why he had to let Colmes go. I always thought it was BS to have a lib'rul who noone apparently knows outside of Fox News to be the foil on Hannity. If Hannity's ideas were worth a damn, he'd have a stronger opposition voice to test them against.

In conclusion, anyone who can't appreciate Hall & Oates does have some key sensors missing.
posted by beelzbubba at 6:05 AM on December 14, 2008