NEW YORK — Within the mid-Seventies, the Eagles have been engaged on a spooky, cryptic new track.
On a lined yellow pad, Don Henley, with enter from band co-founder Glenn Frey, jotted ideas about “a darkish desert freeway” and “a beautiful place” with an expensive floor and ominous undertones. And one thing on ice, maybe caviar or Taittinger — or pink Champagne?
The track, “Resort California,” grew to become considered one of rock’s most indelible singles. And practically a half-century later, these handwritten pages of lyrics-in-the-making have grow to be the middle of an uncommon felony trial set to open Wednesday.
Uncommon-book supplier Glenn Horowitz, former Rock & Roll Corridor of Fame curator Craig Inciardi and memorabilia vendor Edward Kosinski are charged with conspiring to personal and attempt to promote manuscripts of “Resort California” and different Eagles hits with out the best to take action.
The three have pleaded not responsible, and their legal professionals have mentioned the lads dedicated no crime with the papers, which they acquired by way of a author who’d labored with the Eagles. However the Manhattan district lawyer’s workplace says the defendants connived to obscure the paperwork’ disputed possession, regardless of realizing that Henley mentioned the pages have been stolen.
Clashes over invaluable collectibles abound, however felony trials like this are uncommon. Many fights are resolved in non-public, in lawsuits or with agreements to return the gadgets.
“In the event you can keep away from a prosecution by handing over the factor, most individuals simply hand it over,” mentioned Travis McDade, a College of Illinois regulation professor who research uncommon doc disputes.
In fact, the case of the Eagles manuscripts is distinctive in different methods, too.
The prosecutors’ star witness is certainly that: Henley is predicted to testify between Eagles tour stops. The non-jury trial might supply a peek into the band’s inventive course of and life within the quick lane of ’70s stardom.
At concern are over 80 pages of draft lyrics from the blockbuster 1976 “Resort California” album, together with phrases to the chart-topping, Grammy-winning title reduce. It options considered one of traditional rock’s most recognizable riffs, best-known solos and most oft-quoted — arguably overquoted — strains: “You possibly can take a look at any time you want, however you may by no means go away.”
Henley has mentioned the track is about “the darkish underbelly of the American dream.”
It nonetheless was streamed over 220 million instances and received 136,000 radio spins final 12 months within the U.S. alone, in line with the leisure information firm Luminate. The “Resort California” album has bought 26 million copies nationwide through the years, bested solely by an Eagles’ biggest hits disc and Michael Jackson’s “Thriller.”
The pages additionally embody lyrics from songs together with “Life within the Quick Lane” and “New Child in City.” Eagles supervisor Irving Azoff has referred to as the paperwork “irreplaceable items of musical historical past.”
Horowitz, Inciardi and Kosinki are charged with conspiracy to own stolen property and numerous different offenses.
They’re not charged with truly stealing paperwork. Neither is anybody else, however prosecutors will nonetheless have to ascertain that the paperwork have been stolen. The protection maintains that is not true.
A lot activates the Eagles’ interactions with Ed Sanders, a author who additionally co-founded the Nineteen Sixties counterculture rock band the Fugs. He labored within the late ‘70s and early ’80s on a certified Eagles biography that was by no means printed.
Sanders isn’t charged within the case. A cellphone message in search of remark was left for him.
He bought the pages to Horowitz, who then bought them to Inciardi and Kosinski.
Horowitz has dealt with large uncommon e book and archive offers, and he is been entangled in some possession spats earlier than. One concerned papers linked to “Gone With the Wind″ creator Margaret Mitchell. It was settled.
Inciardi labored on notable exhibitions for the Cleveland-based Rock Corridor of Fame. Kosinski has been a principal in Gotta Have It! Collectibles, recognized for auctioning celebrities’ private possessions — so private that Madonna unsuccessfully sued to attempt to cease a sale that included her latex briefs.
Henley informed a grand jury he by no means gave the biographer the lyrics, in line with courtroom filings from Kosinski’s legal professionals. However protection legal professionals have signaled that they plan to probe Henley’s reminiscence of the time.
“We imagine that Mr. Henley voluntarily supplied the lyrics to Mr. Sanders,” lawyer Scott Edelman mentioned in courtroom final week.
Sanders informed Horowitz in 2005 that whereas engaged on the Eagles e book, he was despatched no matter papers he wished from Henley’s residence in Malibu, California, in line with the indictment.
Then Kosinski’s enterprise provided some pages at public sale in 2012. Henley’s attorneys got here knocking. And Horowitz, Inciardi and Sanders, in various combos, started batting round alternate variations of the manuscripts’ provenance, the indictment says.
In a single story, Sanders discovered the pages discarded in a backstage dressing room. In others, he received them from a stage assistant or whereas amassing “plenty of materials associated to the Eagles from completely different folks.” In yet one more, he obtained them from Frey — an account that “would make this go away as soon as and for all,” Horowitz advised in 2017. Frey had died the 12 months earlier than.
“He merely wants light dealing with and reassurance that he isn’t going to the can,” Horowitz emailed Inciardi throughout a 2012 alternate about getting Sanders’ “‘rationalization’ formed right into a communication” to auctioneers, the indictment says.
Sanders provided or signed off on a few of the various explanations, in line with the indictment, and it’s unclear what he could have conveyed verbally. However he apparently rejected a minimum of the dressing-room story.
Kosinki forwarded one rationalization, authorised by Sanders, to Henley’s lawyer. Kosinski additionally assured Sotheby’s public sale home that the musician had “no declare” to the paperwork and requested to maintain potential bidders in the dead of night about Henley’s complaints, the indictment says.
Sotheby’s listed the “Resort California” track lyrics in a 2016 public sale however withdrew them after studying the possession was in query. Sotheby’s is not charged within the case and declined to remark.
Henley purchased some draft lyrics privately from Gotta Have It! for $8,500 in 2012, when he additionally started submitting police reviews, in line with courtroom filings.
Protection legal professionals declare Henley discovered starstruck prosecutors to take up his trigger as a substitute of pursuing a civil swimsuit himself.
The DA’s workplace labored intently with Henley’s authorized staff, and an investigator even yearned for backstage passes for an Eagles present — till a prosecutor mentioned the thought was “fully inappropriate,” Kosinki’s legal professionals mentioned in courtroom papers.
Prosecutors have rebuffed questions on their motivations as “a conspiracy idea slightly than a authorized protection.”
Final 12 months, they wrote in courtroom papers, “It’s the defendants, not the prosecutors, who’re on trial.”
