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The first time John Oates met Daryl Hall was in 1967. The two found themselves rushed in to a service elevator in West Philadelphia's Adelphi Ballroom after a gunfight between neighborhood rival gangs erupted. Fifty years and 21 albums later, Hall & Oates remains the bestselling musical duo of all time, with more than 60 million records sold and 29 Top 40 hits. Today, John and his wife, Aimee, call Nashville home.
In Change of Seasons, John's memoir out now, he shares what it has been like to be one half of an iconic partnership that's been responsible for genre-bending hit songs, such as 'Maneater,” 'She's Gone,” and 'Rich Girl.” The book, which covers John's life up to the years just before he and Aimee moved to Nashville, offers a behind-the-scenes look in to the years of struggle, false starts, and bad deals that preceded the group's astronomical success. He also shares why, at the height of their careers in the mid-1980s, the duo walked away from it all.
From John and Aimee's home in Richland-West End, only a few hints of John's earlier career as an international music superstar pepper the 5,600-square-foot, 1925 Tudor revival. Awards from the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame are nestled in to custom cherry bookshelves, warmly lit by nearby brass sconces in the couple's informal living room. In John's music room, an early 1960s Wurlitzer electric piano takes center stage. Beside it hangs the autographed sheet music for 'We Are the World,” the star-studded song featuring everyone from Michael Jackson to Waylon Jennings.
'I had the presence of mind to grab a black magic marker and walk around getting everyone to sign it,” John writes in Seasons. 'To this day, it is one of my prize possessions.”
In 1985, the same year the duo participated in the 'We Are the World” recording and performed in front of ninety-thousand people for Live Aid, Hall & Oates decided to take a break. John writes, 'There was no place to go but down at that point.” John headed for Colorado to begin a new chapter in life. It was Aspen where John and Aimee would meet and eventually marry in 1994. They settled in nearby Woody Creek, in a small log cabin on five acres, where they spent years meticulously renovating the property.
Creating music, though not front and center in John's mind, was never far away at this time. An invitation from Nashville-based songwriter and producer Keith Follese in the mid-1990s meant yet another new chapter for the Oates' would soon be unfolding.
'When it came time to start my solo work in the early 2000s, I said I need to do it in Nashville,” John says. 'That's when we really started coming here.”
Following years of rental cars and hotel stays, John and Aimee finally settled in to a condo in the Gulch in 2010. 'As soon as I heard the unit number, 615, I said, ‘Great. Perfect,'” Aimee recalls. 'Coming from a ranch in Woody Creek, it was really cool to be in a city again,” John adds. As John's footprint in the Nashville music scene expanded, the couple, whose 20-year-old son, Tanner, lives in Washington, D.C., was spending more time here and less time in Colorado. Motivated to move out of their condo, but unwilling to settle for just anything, the couple continued to wait.
Finally a call from a real estate agent on Mother's Day last year led them to the home they have today.
'When I walked in this house, I went, ‘Oh, my God,'” John recalls. 'In a weird way it felt like our house.”
Immediately attracted to the home's thoughtful details, like floor-to-ceiling cherry wainscoting in the living room, a brass hood and butcher-block island in the kitchen, and marble floors in the foyer, the Oates signed a contract that same day. The couple still spends time at their house and farm in Woody Creek, but home today feels more here than there. Other than decorating the space, the Oates haven't made any changes since they moved in last spring. 'Everyone who has lived in this house since 1925 has done something really tasteful and unique,” John says. 'We feel like its caretakers.”
Though John and Daryl are committed to their own individual projects these days, the duo will hit the road again this spring, when Hall & Oates joins Tears for Fears for a U.S. tour. Plans for a second memoir highlighting 'the Nashville years” is in the works, as well. For John, the city deserves its own book, he says. 'Nashville rekindled my passion for music.”