Judge pauses John Oates’ attempt to sell share of Hall & Oates joint venture

The planned sale of John Oates’ portion of the Hall & Oates partnership will have to wait until he finds out if he can sell it without permission of his longtime collaborator Daryl Hall.

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Oates had planned to sell his share of Whole Oats Enterprises LLP to an investment company, but Chancellor Russell Perkins has ordered the deal to be paused, The Associated Press reported. Whole Oats is a nod to their original name and their first album, The New York Times reported.

The sale may not be completed until February or if an arbitrator imposes a restraining order, Billboard reported.

The deal between Oates and the prospective buyers, Primary Wave IP Investment Management LLC, would involve the Hall & Oates trademarks, name and likeness rights, royalties and internet assets.

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Primary Wave already controls some of the duo’s song catalog and has done so for 15 years, the AP reported.

Hall, 77, called plans from Oates, 75, the “ultimate partnership betrayal.”

Hall had said that Oates blindsided him with the planned sale and that he had lost trust in his partner since the sale was set to close while Hall was on tour.

Hall’s attorney, Christine Lepera, argued, “You cannot sell half of a partnership to a third party without the other party’s consent, and that’s just intuitively correct,” the AP reported.

Oates’ attorney, Tim Warnock said that the allegations that his client went behind Hall’s back were not true, “Mr. Oates proceeded exactly as he was allowed to proceed. Mr. Hall could have done the exact same thing himself.”

Hall and Oates had been together for 50 years, The New York Times reported. Hall was the lead singer and songwriter for most of the band’s hits.

They met in 1967 while performing at a sock hop in Philadelphia. Hall asked Oates to play guitar for his band. Eventually, they started writing songs together and signed a record deal in 1972. They ended up recording 18 studio albums and were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

They had 29 hits on the Top 40 with six no. 1 records.

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