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It was the late 1970s, and the world was enjoying the golden age of rock and roll. The Eagles were mounting a wave of popularity which reached its peak with the launch of “Hotel California” in December 1976.
The album consolidated the Eagles’ place in the American music scene and the band’s status as a rock royalty. But the pages of handwritten lyrics and notes behind some of his most prominent songs mysteriously disappeared shortly thereafter, only to resurface nearly five decades later as the front page of an indictment of the New York State Supreme Court. York.
Three men were charged Tuesday with attempting to sell the paper cache, including about 100 pages full of song lyrics such as “New Kid in Town,” “Life in the Fast Lane” and the iconic “California Hotel” – all and not having the right one. rights to materials.
Rock auctioneer Edward Kosinski, rare book dealer Glenn Horowitz and Rock & Roll Hall of Fame procurement director Craig Inciardi were accused of conspiring to sell the stolen pages, valued at more than one million dollars, lying to the authorities and inventing stories about where the stolen pages were. The materials came from and prevented their rightful owner, Eagles founding member Don Henley, from acquiring them.
“These defendants tried to preserve and sell these unique and valuable manuscripts, even though they knew they had no right to do so. They invented stories about the origin of the documents and their right to possess them so that they could make a profit,” he said. said Manhattan District Attorney Alvin L. Bragg in a press release.
Kosinski, Horowitz and Inciardi’s lawyers, who pleaded not guilty in court on Tuesday, did not immediately respond to requests for comment from The Washington Post. However, in a joint statement, they considered the allegations to be unjustified, Law & Crime reported.
“The prosecutor’s office alleges crime where there is none and unfairly tarnishes the reputation of highly respected professionals,” the men’s lawyers said in a statement to the media. “We will fight vigorously against these unjustified charges. These men are innocent.”
How the newspapers ended up in the hands of three collecting moguls, and almost sold by auction giants Sotheby’s and Christie’s, is a story that begins when former Eagles guitarist Don Felder began writing the song “Hotel California.” after joining the group in 1974.
Now it’s the Eagles vs. California hotel in federal court
Felder shared a demo reminiscent of “Mexican reggae” with Henley and Glenn Frey, the Eagles leader who died in 2016, and devised the concept and cinematic lyrics of the song, which would eventually catapult the eponymous album to the number 1. in 1977. Since then, “Hotel California” – which is inspired by hotel life and “the dark side of the American dream,” Henley told CBS News – has spawned conspiracy theories about his lyrics and praise for his haunting guitar arpeggio.
The process of creating the song was documented by Henley in pages that disappeared after a writer who was working on a book about the band took over. The writer, who was not identified in the indictment, sold the items in 2005 to Horowitz, who in turn sold them to the other two men, according to court documents.
When Henley realized that Inciardi and Kosinki were trying to sell the lost manuscripts, he told them they were stolen materials, asked them back, and filed police reports. However, “instead of making any effort to make sure they actually owned the property, the defendants responded by participating in a campaign for years to prevent Henley from retrieving the manuscripts,” prosecutors allege.
Although prosecutors claim the unnamed writer stole the papers, in communications with the accused trio, the writer said in 2012 that he recalled “having found the discarded material in a backstage locker room of a concert of the Eagles “. He later said he acquired them through Henley’s assistant after a stay at the musician’s house in Malibu. In 2016, the writer changed his story again, saying Frey had secretly given him the papers, a convenient way, prosecutors say, of claiming ownership of the materials once Frey died and could no longer dispute the account.
Frey “unfortunately is dead and identifying him as a source would make this go away once and for all,” Horowitz was quoted as saying in an email that year, according to court documents.
Don Henley says the Eagles are over. It was always Glenn Frey’s band.
According to the indictment, the changing narratives were part of a five-year effort to auction off the materials. While Sotheby’s and Christie’s were initially interested in selling the papers, the items never reached the auction; as of December 2016, authorities began executing search warrants to recover materials from Sotheby’s and Kosinski’s home in New Jersey.
Now, it looks like the 100 pages of scribbles, notes and letters will return to Henley.
“No one has the right to sell illegally obtained property or benefit from the absolute theft of irreplaceable pieces of music history,” Henley manager Irving Azoff told Billboard. “These handwritten letters are an integral part of the legacy that Don Henley has created over his more than 50-year career. We look forward to the return of Don’s property, so that he and his family can enjoy and preserve it. posterity “.