I have a very interesting little story for all of you in regards to this song and it's meaning. About 15 years ago, I was taking an English class in University, and the and the professor of the class had an assignment for us. He handed out a sheet of paper face down to everyone. When we turned it over, we were told to write what we thought the song was about. He added, however, that the song was NOT about a cult so don't even write that. So, basically almost every member of the class then proceeded along the next route....the drugs/addiction metaphors. When we were done, he proceeded to tell us what the song, and the corresponding album were ACTUALLY about. It seems our prof had, at one time, lived in the California area and was very good friends with a certain drummer named Don Henley. Don explained the story behind the song to him, and said he was amused at the wide varieties of interpretations the song had developed over time. According to the source, The "Hotel California" is actually, L.A. itself. The song and album take you on a trip though the music industry in L.A. in the late sixties early seventies, when agents and studios controlled artists like puppets. Back in the late sixties, 1969 to be exact, there was a major onslaught of artists being signed left, right and center, and artisit at the time were often known to basically "sell their soul" to a record company executive in order to get a recording contract. Many times these artists were given little if anything for their music, and thus ended up basically a victom to their love of music. Just imagine the scene at the time, it's late 60's, you are on your way to L.A. to strike it big with dreams of glamour and fame...and you basically are prepared to sell your soul of you have to to attain it. I must admit, when I first heard this explaination, I was a little skeptical...but trust me....listen to the WHOLE album again, start to finish and keep this definition in mind when you do it. Every song ties together in one big story, finishing off with the Last Resort which gives you a clear summery of the whole album and idea. I don't deny that drugs and addiction have a lot to do with the lifestyle and results of the quest for fame. All I ask is to keep an open mind and think of "The Hotel California" as L.A., and you may be surprised.
I'm Impressed. Way to not follow the crowd and type out an obviously wrong retarded answer having to do with drugs, cults, or Satan worship. Good job daffyb keep it up.
daffyb, and who ever i seeing this comment, i can clearly see proof that this song is not about a cult or satanic worship. But can someone who says it about a cult or satanic worship please show me proof from this song. Cause i really want to know the truth behind this song. Thank you
Don Henley actually admitted publicly that he is a Satan worshipper.
The album's lyrics were designed to be vague to the outsiders. But it has a clear meaning only to the members of the cult. Perhaps, back then, they were not sure how public would react if they knew about the satanic church. But now, our world has become more liberal than ever, so they finally decided it is safe to reveal the truth.
@daffyb This is the ABSOLUTE BEST review I've ever read concerning this song. I've heard Don Henley give the EXACT explanation that you rendered above -- but for some strange reason, people still stick to their own interpretation(s) of this song. BRILLIANT review! BRILLIANT!
@daffyb Fair enough. And you're probably right. None the less (and speaking from experience) this, to me, is about drug addiction. It just fits. But, to each his/her own.
@daffyb This is essentially what the mentor I had at work said when I lived in SoCal in the late 90's. The "check out anytime you like but you can never leave" line stems from the fact that it is difficult to get out of SoCal. I had difficulty myself doing so, and I wasn't even a dirt-poor musician.
@daffyb On the various interpretations, Henley said: "Some of the wilder interpretations of that song have been amazing. It was really about the excesses of American culture and certain girls we knew. But it was also about the uneasy balance between art and commerce."[49]
How come nobody says anything about these "certain girls we knew". There are a lot of references to sex in the lyrics. Like there are somme really pretty girls that know a lot of guys and they call them their "friends". Gee, I wonder how these girls make their money. And what does "colitas" mean In Spanish...small tails or small tales.And also stab with their steely knives is that a reference the mail cucumber. And there are mirrors on the ceiling because there these certain hotels that have a bed and a mirror on the ceiling and the couples like to get on the bed and talk about record companies while they look at themselves in the mirror. sex sex sex.
I think the song is metaphorical, but something that can be made sense of. The Hotel California represents the California high-life...the promise of the fame and fortune of the 70s that brought people to the state...from an outsiders point of view, it is attractive and draws people (like a drug)...however, be careful..."you can check out anytime you want, but you can never leave"...once there, it is hard to escape. Henley didn't literally mean California...he meant the trappings of "ego" ....the mind state of being absorbed by pleasures and the "self"...as they can never bring true happiness.
No doubt it's a metaphor. What else can it possibly be? But then, lo and behold, I've actually visited a small business establishment in Southern California called Hotel California. Go figure.
Yes, but it means different things on different levels. At the beginning, there is there is the guy driving towards LA (as stated by Henley and Frey in interviews), and he smell Colitas, dried Marijuana seeds, and sees the lights in the distance. LA has a lovely face, and is "Tiffany-twisted". Later, we hear that "We haven't had that spirit hear since 1969". Henley said that this is a reference to cool music and Woodstock. The spirit of good music died at the end of 69, and the disco era was now here. The LA hedonism circuit, which leads to destruction, which is also reprised in 'Fast Lane, also extends to that life anywhere at any time. Then there's a bunch o' stuff which I am too lazy to write about.
S
I think "check out" is more than literally trying to get out and failing...this is slang for dropping out, becoming uninvolved, especially from society or other larger concerns, and perhaps with a hint of doing so with drugs, although it can certainly happen in many other contexts. All things that laid-back Californians are often accused of doing. This is one of the Eagle's many subtle double-entendres (one of my other favorites being Life in the Fast Lane's "he was too tired to make it"
Don Felder from the Eagles:
I remember the day when I came up with the idea for the song:
"I had just leased this house out on the beach at Malibu--I guess it was around '74 or '75. I remember sitting in the living room, with the doors wide open, on a spectacular July day. I had a bathing suit on and I was sitting on this couch, soaking wet, thinking the world is a wonderful place to be. I had this acoustic 12-string and started tinkling around with it, and those 'Hotel California' chords just kind of oozed out. I had a TEAC four-track set up in one of the back bedrooms and I ran back there to put this idea down before I forgot it. I also had one of those old Rhythm Ace things, and I remember it was set to play this cha-cha beat. I played the 12-string on top of that. A few days later, I came up with a bass line and mixed the whole thing to mono, ping-ponging back and forth on this little four-track."
Eagles singer/guitarist Don Henley picked the song out of a cassette containing eight or ten different ideas that Felder had put together. "Henley said, "I really love that one that sounds like a matador or something," Felder recalls.
Originally written and recorded in E minor, the song was ultimately transposed to B-minor and re-recorded to accommodate the vocal melody delivered by Henley. Felder capoed his acoustic 12-string at the seventh fret, which enabled him to preserve the open chord shapes of his original guitar arrangement. The "High strung" timbre produced by the capo's placement, enhanced by processing the 12-string through a Leslie cabinet, ended up becoming part of the song's distinctive sound. Felder played all of the song's guitar tracks except for the landmark solo, for which Felder and Joe Walsh traded licks and harmonies. "Joe and I sat on two stools and worked the whole thing out," Felder recalls.
Don Henley and Glenn Frey collaborated on the song's memorable lyric. "Glenn had this idea," Felder remembers. "The fantasy of California. It's supposed to be a microcosm of the world. Glenn is great at conceptualizing. He'll say, 'I can see this guy driving in the desert at night and you can see the lights of L.A. way off in the horizon.' Henley gets the picture and goes from there.
i aslo agree that lyrics (especially from this song) are subject to many different interpetations. That's the beauty of lyrics and poetry in general. However, I heard the "meaning" of this song described once and i thought it was a great interpretation, so im resharing it. I heard it described as "a cynical view of paradise." When you think about it that way it could mean drugs, the entertainment business, or simply a supposed paradise because they all fit people's ideas of paradise. Its a vague interpretation but it allows you to decide what the song means to you, and that (in my opinion) is one of the reasons we listen to music in the first place.
I know what this song is about, not a cult it's about drugs.
"Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way " That's not a candle she's lighting up.
"Some dance to remember, some dance to forget" Some people do them do remember good memories, some people do them to forget bad memories.
'We are all just prisoners here, of our own device" That is basically what drug users are
"The stab it with their steely knives But they just can't kill the beast" The beast being the addiction/
"You can checkout any time you like, but you can never leave!" You can always say you aren't addicted or that you can quit anytime you want, but you'll always end up going back to them.
Pretty basic clear maening, there are other metaphors in there to decipher but that's tha basics.
Okay just so everyone stops arguing about this, The song is about hedonism and self-destruction in the late 1970's Southern California Music Industry. Don Felder did a talk show on the Howard Stern Show and said, and I quote,
"Don Henley and Glen wrote most of the words. All of us kind of drove into LA at night. Nobody was from California, and if you drive into LA at night... you can just see this glow on the horizon of lights, and the images that start running through your head of Hollywood and all the dreams that you have, and so it was kind of about that... what we started writing the song about. Coming into LA... and from that Life In The Fast Lane came out of it, and Wasted Time and a bunch of other songs."
He also stated that the band refutes and claims that the song has anything to do with satanic churches or mental hospitals, etc.
"colitas" in the first stanza of the song is a desert flower, also known as Antelope sage or Colita de Rata, Don Henley has made many references to the "heady desert flower"
Also "Killing the beast" has nothing to do with a drug addiction. The line "stab it with their steely knives But they just can't kill the beast" is a reference as a playful nod to Steely Dan in return for the Eagles being referred to in the song "Everything you did" as "Turn up the Eagles, the neighbors are listening".
aight duder you got it, but i thought "they stab it with their steely knives" is the coke, they are cutting it up- "stabbing it with their steely knives" the knives arre razors, and yeah the "beast" that they cant kill is the addiction.
slight problem with what your saying. the stabbing it with their steely knives takes place at the feast in the masters quarters. the masters chambers represent prestige or prestigious events ie supposedly glamourous lifestyles etc and the beast is presented in opposition to this. therefore the beast is the true art, ie, an artists music, and the feast in the masters chambers is the devouring of this art in the name of money and glamour, ie the record company executives exploiting the artists. the beast is life.
Looking at your explaination, your probably right, but i had a slightly different vuew. I thought about it being about California being captivating. It makes it sound like California is so atractive, and it just keeps calling you back, and teh pretty boys she called friends could have attributed to the vanity sterotyped to the region. I went to a leadership conference their, and know I want to go to colleg their soooooo bad ( im a high school senior) looking at your explaination and teh time in which th esong was written though, yours makes much more sense.
personally i think the song is about cannibals luring people in and eating them as the last set of lyrics would dictate "The stab it with their steely knives But they just can't kill the beast" the beast being a victim they have taken in and are now devouring, and the character in the song is the next victim similar to what they do in the movie hostel.
@Deth "Steely" was a reference to Steely Dan who had referenced the Eagles in one of his songs. That is, according to the band members themselves. It is ok to have a subjective interpretation, especially for a song like this. The band has made it clear though, this song is about excess and hedonism in LA... but can also be applied to many parts of America.
@Deth
I mostly agree. "Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air". Colitas is a Mexican term for marijuana so there is a clear drug reference. However, I still think this song is about a mental hospital. I loved your outlook though.
In the booklet for the Very Best of the Eagles album it says:
"The song began as a demo tape, an instrumental by Don Felder. He'd been submitting tapes and song ideas to us since he'd joined the band, always instrumentals, since he didn't sing. But this particular demo, unlike many of the others had room for singing. It immediately got our attention. The first working title, the name we gave it, was "Mexican Reggae."
For us, "Hotel California" was definately thinking and writing outside the box. Similar to "Desperado," we did not start out to make any sort of concept or theme album. But when we wrote "Life in the Fast Lane" and started working on "Hotel California" and "New Kid In Town" with J.D., we knew we were heading down a long and twisted corridor and just stayed with it. Songs from the dark side-the Eagles take a look at the seamy underbelly of L.A.-the flip side of fame and failure, love and money.
"They stab it with their Steely knives, but they just can't kill the beast" was a little Post-It back to Steely Dan. Apparently, Walter Becker's girlfriend loved the Eagles, and she played them all the time. I think it drove him nuts. So, the story goes that they were having a fight one day, and that was the genesis of the line, "turn up the Eagles, the neighbors are listening" in "Everything You Did," from Steely Dan's The Royal Scam album. During the writing of "Hotel California," we decided to volley. We just wanted to allude to Steely Dan rather than mentioning them outright, so "Dan" got changed to "knices," which is still, you know, a penile metaphor. Stabbing, thrusting, etc.
Almost everybody in my buisness can write music, play guitar, play piano, create chord progressions, etc., but it's only when you add lyrics and melody and voices to these things that they take on an identity and become something beyond the sum of the original parts. I remember that Henley and I were listening to the "Hotel California" demo tape together on an airplane, and we were talking about what we would write and how we wanted to be more cinematic. We wanted this song to open like an episode of The Twilight Zone-just one shot after another.
I remember De Niro in The Last Tycoon. He's got this scene, and he's talking to some other people in his office. He speaks to them: "The door opens... the camera is on a person's feet... he walks across the room... we pan up to the table... he picks up a pack of matches that says 'The Such-And-Such Club' on it... strikes a match and lights a cigarette... puts it out... goes over to the window... opens the shade... looks out... the moon is there... what does it mean? Nothing. It's just the movies." "Hotel California" is like that. We take this guy and make him like a character in The Magus, where every time he walks through a door there's a new version of reality. We wanted to write a song just like it was a movie. This guy is driving across the desert. He's tired. He's smokin'. Comes up over a hill, sees some lights, pulls in. First thing he sees is a really strange guy at the front door, welcoming him: "Come on in." Walks in, and then it becomes Fellini-esque-- strange women, effeminate men, shadowy corridors, disembodied voices, debauchery, illusion... Weirdness. So we thought, "Let's really take some chances. Let's try to write in a way that we've never written before." Steely Dan inspired us because of their lyrical bravery and willingness to go "out there." So, for us, "Hotel California" was about thinking and writing outside the box."
This song has many astonishing similarities to Jean-Paul Sartre's "No Exit". Nearly every line of this song has a direct parallel with the character's experiences in Hell, although I do not recognize any references to Inez.
I do believe that there are minor drug references but overall it revolves around "No Exit".
@injun42 I've never thought of this, but you make an excellent point, for in that play people create their own hell, which is what HC's woman essentially confesses in the third verse.
And more from Don Henley:
There’s a picture of the Beverly Hills Hotel on the front, which is really THE hotel in California; very elegant and very decadent at the same time. It’s a romantic place and you can see all kinds of people there—You see a lot of tourist types, a lot of very glamorous movie star people, and a lot of phony people. A lot of real people too. A lot of people have parties there, so that’s what the front of the album cover is. It’s shot from a crane about 100 to 150 feet up in the air, at sunset. There are black silhouettes of palm trees and the sky is a kind of rusty, smoky color. We superimposed a neon sign that says ‘Hotel California’, because we couldn’t use the name Beverly Hills Hotel: we’d probably have been sued.
nice greetings
I grew up in Camarillo California, the rumor that the song was based around the mental hospital outside of town made sence, if you listen to the lyrics, dark desert highway, it was located out side of town, you can check out but you can never leave. It's call Camarillo State mantal institute and was closed down in 97, but as a kid I always spent Halloween there, when it still open, they have a bell tower!
@Vendzilla Yes I have read about that fascinating place. I first heard Hotel California when it was first released and I actually worked in a hospital similar to Camarillo. I thought it was about. a hedonistic lifestyle and a woman with power over men and so he visitor stayed. First impressions than.
Their Greatest Hits 1971-1975 Hell Freezes Over Eagles Greatest Hits, Vol. 2 Caribbean Steeldrums: 20 Famous Tropical Melodies- Calypso, Samba And My Heart... Selected Works: 1972-1999 The Very Best of the Eagles [1994] The Very Best of the Eagles [2001] The Very Best Of [2003] Hotel California/Desperado Desperado/Hotel California/The Long Run The Complete Greatest Hits [Warner] The Complete Greatest Hits The Best of the Eagles [Asylum] Greatest Hits, Vol. 2 The Very Best Of [2007] Hell Freezes Over [DTS] The Legend of Eagles Tapestries: The Music of the Eagles Hotel California [Japan] Live Hotel California/Long Run Hotel California Eagles [Box Set] Eagles [Box Set]
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Don Henley actually admitted publicly that he is a Satan worshipper.
The album's lyrics were designed to be vague to the outsiders. But it has a clear meaning only to the members of the cult. Perhaps, back then, they were not sure how public would react if they knew about the satanic church. But now, our world has become more liberal than ever, so they finally decided it is safe to reveal the truth.
How come nobody says anything about these "certain girls we knew". There are a lot of references to sex in the lyrics. Like there are somme really pretty girls that know a lot of guys and they call them their "friends". Gee, I wonder how these girls make their money. And what does "colitas" mean In Spanish...small tails or small tales.And also stab with their steely knives is that a reference the mail cucumber. And there are mirrors on the ceiling because there these certain hotels that have a bed and a mirror on the ceiling and the couples like to get on the bed and talk about record companies while they look at themselves in the mirror. sex sex sex.
S
"Don Henley and Glen wrote most of the words. All of us kind of drove into LA at night. Nobody was from California, and if you drive into LA at night... you can just see this glow on the horizon of lights, and the images that start running through your head of Hollywood and all the dreams that you have, and so it was kind of about that... what we started writing the song about. Coming into LA... and from that Life In The Fast Lane came out of it, and Wasted Time and a bunch of other songs."
He also stated that the band refutes and claims that the song has anything to do with satanic churches or mental hospitals, etc.
"colitas" in the first stanza of the song is a desert flower, also known as Antelope sage or Colita de Rata, Don Henley has made many references to the "heady desert flower"
Also "Killing the beast" has nothing to do with a drug addiction. The line "stab it with their steely knives But they just can't kill the beast" is a reference as a playful nod to Steely Dan in return for the Eagles being referred to in the song "Everything you did" as "Turn up the Eagles, the neighbors are listening".
The End
but yeah, this songs DEFINATELY about drugs.
On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair....... it refers to our life
Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light .... its refers to the light after u die
There she stood in the doorway;........................ "She" refers to angel of death
�this could be heaven or this could be hell�........... just as it is
Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way....... way down to hell
all the stuff next describes the stuff happening in hell...refer google
And in the master�s chambers,.............................devils lair
The stab it with their steely knives,......................u try to kill the devil
But they just can�t kill the beast........................u cannot kill him so u can escape
You can checkout any time you like,
But you can never leave! ..................................u cannot leave from hell
I mostly agree. "Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air". Colitas is a Mexican term for marijuana so there is a clear drug reference. However, I still think this song is about a mental hospital. I loved your outlook though.