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Written by Don Henley, Glenn Frey and Don Felder, this song is about materialism and excess. California is used as the setting, but it could relate to anywhere in America. Don Henley in the London Daily Mail November 9, 2007 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."
On November 25, 2007 Henley appeared on the TV news show 60 Minutes, where he was told, "everyone wants to know what this song means." Henley replied: "I know, it's so boring. It's a song about the dark underbelly of the American Dream, and about excess in America which was something we knew about."
California is seen from the perspective of an outsider here. Only Bernie Leadon and Timothy B. Schmit were from the state: Joe Walsh came from Kansas, Don Henley was from Texas, Glenn Frey was from Detroit, and Don Felder was from Florida. In our
interview with Don Felder, he explained: "As you're driving in Los Angeles at night, you can see the glow of the energy and the lights of Hollywood and Los Angeles for 100 miles out in the desert. And on the horizon, as you're driving in, all of these images start coming into your mind of the propaganda and advertisement you've experienced about California. In other words, the movie stars, the stars on Hollywood Boulevard, the beaches, bikinis, palm trees, all those images that you see and that people think of when they think of California start running through your mind. You're anticipating that. That's all you know of California."
Don Henley put it this way: "We were all middle-class kids from the Midwest. Hotel California was our interpretation of the high life in Los Angeles."
This won the 1977 Grammy for Record Of The Year. The band did not show up to accept the award, as Don Henley did not believe in contests.
Timothy B. Schmit had just joined the band, and he says they watched the ceremony on TV while they were rehearsing.
Don Felder came up with the musical idea for this song. According to his book Heaven and Hell: My Life in The Eagles, he came up with the idea while playing on the beach. He had the chord progressions and basic guitar tracks, which he played for Don Henley and Glenn Frey, who helped finish the song, with Henley adding the lyrics. Felder says they recorded the song about a year after he did the original demo, and in the session, he started to improvise the guitar part at the end. Henley stopped him and demanded that he do it exactly like the demo, so he had to call his housekeeper and have her play the cassette demo over the phone so Felder could remember what he played.
The lyric, "Warm smell of colitas," is often interpreted as sexual slang or a reference to marijuana. When we asked Don Felder about the term, he said: "The colitas is a plant that grows in the desert that blooms at night, and it has this kind of pungent, almost funky smell. Don Henley came up with a lot of the lyrics for that song, and he came up with colitas."
The Eagles aimed for a full sensory experience in their songwriting. Felder adds, "When we try to write lyrics, we try to write lyrics that touch multiple senses, things you can see, smell, taste, hear. 'I heard the mission bell,' you know, or 'the warm smell of colitas,' talking about being able to relate something through your sense of smell. Just those sort of things. So that's kind of where 'colitas' came from."
This was recorded at three different sessions before the Eagles got the version they wanted. The biggest problem was finding the right key for Henley's vocal.
Glenn Frey compares this to an episode of
The Twilight Zone, where it jumps from one scene to the next and doesn't necessarily make sense. He says the success of the song comes from the audience creating stories in their minds based on the images.
The line "They stab it with their steely knives but they just can't kill the beast" is a reference to Steely Dan. The bands shared the same manager and had a friendly rivalry. The year before, Steely Dan included the line "Turn up the Eagles, the neighbors are listening" on their song "Everything You Did."
Don Felder and Joe Walsh played together on the guitar solos, creating the textured sound.
The lyrics for the song came with the album. Some listeners thought the line "She's got the Mercedes Bends" was a misspelling of "Mercedes Benz," not realizing the line was a play on words.
Glenn Frey: "That record explores the under belly of success, the darker side of Paradise. Which was sort of what we were experiencing in Los Angeles at that time. So that just sort of became a metaphor for the whole world and for everything you know. And we just decided to make it Hotel California. So with a microcosm of everything else going on around us." (thanks, Moomin - London, England)
When the Eagles got back together in 1994, they recorded a live, acoustic version of this song for an MTV special that was included on their album
Hell Freezes Over. Don Felder came up with a new guitar intro for this version the day they recorded it, and while it was not released as a single, it got a lot of airplay, helped the album top the charts the first week it was released, and was nominated for a Grammy for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal, a category introduced in 1980 when the Eagles won with "
Heartache Tonight."
Felder had some beef with how the credits were listed on this new version - the original single had the composers as "Don Felder, Don Henley and Glenn Frey," implying that Felder wrote most of the song and Frey the least. The new version was credited to "Don Henley, Glenn Frey and Don Felder." Felder claims that Henley and Frey added nothing original to the new version, and that this was simply a power play. Felder was fired from the band in 2001 after disputing payments and royalties.
All 7 past and present members of the Eagles performed this in 1998 when they were inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame.
The hotel on the album cover is the Beverly Hills Hotel, known as the Pink Palace. It is often frequented by Hollywood stars. The photo was taken by photographers David Alexander and John Kosh, who sat in a cherry-picker about 60 feet above Sunset Boulevard to get the shot of the hotel at sunset from above the trees. The rush-hour traffic made it a harrowing experience. Check out the
hotel.
Although it is well known that Hotel California is actually a metaphor, there are several strange Internet theories and urban legends about the "real" Hotel California. Some include suggestions that it was an old church taken over by devil worshippers, a psychiatric hospital, an inn run by cannibals or Aleister Crowley's mansion in Scotland. It's even been suggested that the "Hotel California" is the Playboy Mansion. (thanks, Adam - Dewsbury, England)
The music may have been inspired by the 1969 Jethro Tull song "We Used to Know," from their album
Stand up. The chord progressions are nearly identical, and the bands toured together before the Eagles recorded "Hotel California." In a BBC radio interview, Jethro Tull frontman Ian Anderson said laughingly that he was still waiting for the royalties. In
Ian Anderson's interview with Songfacts, he makes it clear that he doesn't consider "Hotel California" to be borrowing anything from his song: "It's difficult to find a chord sequence that hasn't been used, and hasn't been the focus of lots of pieces of music. It's harmonic progression is almost a mathematical certainty you're gonna crop up with the same thing sooner or later if you sit strumming a few chords on a guitar. There's certainly no bitterness or any sense of plagiarism attached to my view on it, although I do sometimes allude, in a joking way, to accepting it as a kind of tribute."
After Don Henley came up with the title, a theme developed for the album. Don Felder told us how some of the other songs fit in: "Once you arrive in LA and you have your first couple of hits, you become the '
New Kid In Town,' and then with greater success, you live '
Life In The Fast Lane,' and you start wondering if all that time you've spent in the bars was just '
Wasted Time.' So all of these other song ideas kind of came out of that concept once the foundation was laid for 'Hotel California.' It was a really insightful title."
Don Felder: "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 all the doors wide open on a spectacular July day. I had this acoustic 12-string and I started tinkling around with it, and those Hotel California chords just kind of oozed out. Every once in a while it seems like the cosmos part and something great just plops in your lap." (thanks, Stone - Libertyville, IL)
An alternative interpretation of the meaning of the lyrics is that the song is a description of the journey from Need to Love and Marriage to Divorce and ultimately to the impossibility of regaining the life and happiness of the pre-divorce state.
Initially the traveler is feeling the need of a relationship ("My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim, I had to stop for the night"). The traveler meets his love and gets married ("There she stood in the doorway. I heard the mission bell"). A marriage commitment opens up the possibility of happiness but also the traveler is aware and vulnerable to the possibility of intense unhappiness ("And I was thinking to myself, this could be heaven or this could be hell")
Unfortunately the marriage dissolves and his love becomes obsessed with money ("Her mind is Tiffany-twisted") where Tiffany" refers to the very expensive jewelry store, Tiffany & Co. With the divorce there is the division of property - she got the Mercedes Benz. After the breakup when he sees her with any guys she reassures him that the pretty, pretty boys" are just friends." In this new world of being single the other singles he meets do their dance in the courtyard" of life. They generally fall into two groups: There are those who can't stop talking about their Ex ("Some dance to remember") and there are those who don't what to say anything at all about their past marriage ("some dance to forget").
Now in this world of being divorced he longs to return the pre-divorced state of happiness ("So I called up the captain, please bring me my wine"), but he finds that his happiness is now irrevocably in the past ("We haven't had that spirit here since 1969").
Deep into the post-divorce single's scene with "mirrors on the ceiling, the pink champagne on ice" he is reminded that "we are all just prisoners here, of our own device." He and others want this divorce nightmare to be over, yet - "they stab it with their steely knives, but they just can't kill the beast." Now frustrated, he panics and is "running for the door. I had to find the passage back to the place I was before" But he is brought up short when the night man informs him that "You can checkout any time you like (commit suicide), but you can never leave" (become pre-divorced).
There are two choruses in the song and each mention the "Hotel California." Around the time the song was written, California was experiencing the highest divorce rate in the nation. Each chorus has lines that remember his past marriage ("Such a lovely place") and his past lover ("Such a lovely face"). The first chorus indicates that there can always be more divorces ("Plenty of room at the Hotel California, any time of year, you can find it here"). The second chorus points out that as a part of divorce you will always "bring your alibis." (thanks, David - Redwood City, CA)
The Hotel California album is #37 on the Rolling Stone list of the 500 Greatest Albums of all time. According to the magazine, Don Henley said that the band was in pursuit of a note perfect song. The Eagles spent 8 months in the studio polishing take after take after take. Henley also said, "We just locked ourselves in. We had a refrigerator, a ping pong table, roller skates and a couple cots. We would go in and stay for 2 or 3 days at a time." (thanks, Ray - Stockton, NJ)
According to a reader-submitted poll for Guitar World magazine, the guitar solo for this song is ranked #8 out of 100. (thanks, Romeo - Belo Horizonte, Brazil)
Don Felder told
Gibson.com about his contribution to this track. "I thought it was really unique and different to anything ever written. The Eagles had been heading in a conventional country-rock direction. I was added to the band for my electric guitar, slide-electric ability and to help turn them into more of a rock and roll band. I was writing stronger guitar tracks that used electric guitar like '
Victim of Love' and 'Hotel California.' When I came up with the 'Hotel California' progression, I knew it was unique but didn't know if it was appropriate for the Eagles. It was kind of reggae, almost an abstract guitar part for what was on the radio back then.
When I was writing for the
Hotel California album, I was working on a TEAC 4-track in a beach house in Malibu and I was putting down ideas on tape. Then I made cassette copies and gave them to [Don] Henley, [Glenn] Frey, Walsh and [Randy] Meisner. Henley called me to say he really like the Mexican bolero, Mexican reggae song. I knew exactly which track he meant. Don came up with a great lyric concept for the song."
This followed "New Kid in Town" as the second single released from the album. There was no doubt about the song's merits as an album track, but issuing it as a single defied convention. Don Felder told us: "when we finally finished that whole album, the record company had been pounding on the door trying to get in and get this record, because they wanted to release it. We were about four months overdue on delivering our record per our contract. So we finally let the record company in. The execs come in and we had this playback party for them at the record plant here in Los Angeles. And after the song 'Hotel California' played, Henley turned around and said, 'That's going to be our single.'
In the '70s, the AM format, which was what we were really aiming for, had a specific formula; your song had to be between three minutes and three minutes and thirty seconds long, and it had to be a dance track, a rock track, or a trippy ballad. The introduction could only be 30 seconds long before the singer started, so the disc jockey didn't have to speak so long.
'Hotel California' is six and a half minutes long. The introduction to it is a minute long. You can't really dance to it. It stops in the middle when the drums stop: 'mirrors on the ceiling,' that section, and it's got a two minute guitar solo on the end. It's the complete wrong format.
So I said, 'Don, I think you're wrong. I think that's a mistake. I don't think we should put that out as the single. Maybe an FM cut, but not a single.' And he said, 'Nope, that's going to be our single.' And I've never been so delighted to have been so wrong in my life. You just don't know."
In Chicago at the time of this song's popularity many people called the Cook County jail "Hotel California" because it is on California street. The name stuck and now people of all ages and races refer to the jail by this nickname. (thanks, Jesse - Chicago, IL)
Comments (483):
Shaun Morgan of Seether
Shaun breaks down the Seether songs, including the one about his brother, the one about Ozzy, and the one that may or may not be about his ex-girlfriend Amy Lee.
Steve Forbert - "Romeo's Tune"
"Let me smell the moon in your perfume..." It took a rough mix and an extra verse, but Steve found his "calling card" song, which is
always the encore.
Joe Ely
The renown Texas songwriter has been at it for 40 years, with tales to tell about The Flatlanders and The Clash - that's Joe's Tex-Mex on "Should I Stay or Should I Go?"
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the song is about..... the Manson family.
I would be interested to hear views, i think may of you may see some lyrics fall in to place straight away. If you look harder, at the back ground & personalities of the family it fits even more. Even gives the date of their infamous killings.
I know I said I wasn't gonna spell it out but the clincher for me is the line "Her mind is Tiffany twisted She's got the Mercedes bends" Look at the back ground of many of the young women who joined the family. This was just another piece for me but it made it certain in my mind that its about "The Family" ...
Desert highway,
1969,
This could be heaven or this could be hell,
The Captain,
The Mirrors on the ceiling
Pink champagne on ice
prisoners here
Of our own device
Masters chambers
STEELY KNIVES!!
The beast
Check out anytime... but never leave.
Read not just about what Manson, Van Houten, Atkins, Fromme, and the rest did but also who they were, where they had come from, what they were looking for, the era...
Hotel California was a real place in the californian desert called Spahn Ranch!
OK here's the deal - I seriously doubt that he wrote it thats why he refused the grammy.
On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair
(On the criminal path alone and going fast, feeling good and on top of the world)
Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air
(Cannabis harvest is ready, selling and making money)
Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light
(Some time after but a near future, The police came and took him)
My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim
(Sadness and anger for the thought about years in prison)
I had to stop for the night.
(Going to jail because of the path)
There she stood in the doorway;
(Justitia or Lady justice in the court house saying who is guilty or not)
I heard the mission bell
(God or San Miguel Arcangel calling him to church)
And I was thinking to myself
'This could be heaven or this could be Hell'
(He can either make the best or worst of the situation)
Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way
(Probably a dream were Lady justice saying its your chance last to do good)
There were voices down the corridor,
(All the inmates trying to psykeout and crack the fresh fish)
I thought I heard them say
Welcome to the Hotel California
(Welcome to San Quentin State Prison, CA )
Such a lovely place (such a lovely place)
(double lyrics here probably means the oposite, worst place ever for gen pop.)
Such a lovely face.
(but looks very god in societies eyes)
Plenty of room at the Hotel California
(Prisoners get killed all the time so never a problem to take in new)
Any time of year (any time of year) you can find it here
(They never find the guilty but it happens all the time)
Her mind is Tiffany-twisted, she got the Mercedes bends
(Realisation of how the world works, bling bling pays for AB)
(But it might actually be about the AB formation you have to ask actor "Danny Trejo" he was there so maybe some kosher-nostra, cosa-nostra hook :/)
She got a lot of pretty, pretty boys, that she calls friends
(He calls em ugly killers, the jews thinks its there allied)
How they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat
(He watches as they fight in the yard, to the last man standing)
Some dance to remember, some dance to forget
(Some fights are for the history books, others isn't)
So I called up the Captain,
(Asks to speak to probably the warden or prison priest)
'Please bring me my wine'
(Let me go to church and take the holy communion)
He said, 'we haven't had that spirit here since nineteen sixty-nine'
(He thanks him for realizing drugs corrupts the church, something about Nixon's war on drugs after becoming president)
And still those voices are calling from far away,
(Since he is not i a gang they still try to crack him)
Wake you up in the middle of the night
(Not really sure can mean getting raped? or stabbed)
Just to hear them say"
(Only cus they try to crack him)
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place (such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face.
They livin' it up at the Hotel California
(Treating him as a girl?, acting like animals)
What a nice surprise (what a nice surprise), bring your alibis
(Just as he expected not a surprise at all, think he means going to another place in his mind, or if he got stabbed they have to prove their innocence)
Mirrors on the ceiling,
(his mind is growing dark and becoming like them)
The pink champagne on ice
(Pushing his female lust a side)
And she said, 'we are all just prisoners here, of our own device'
(This is our own fault they the people put this system in place)
And in the master's chambers,
(He ganged upp whit others and became a leader)
They gathered for the feast
(they prepared and planned there revenge)
They stab it with their steely knives,
(Trying to destroy the enemy gang)
But they just can't kill the beast
(But the fail?)
Last thing I remember, I was Running for the door
(Tried to escape maybe, or begging for his life)
I had to find the passage back to the place I was before
(Either had to get to freedom or make peace with the gang)
'Relax' said the night man,
(chill its maximum sec. said the guards)
'We are programmed to receive.
(We only take prisoners in)
You can check out any time you like,
(You can take your life)
But you can never leave!'
(But never be free)
----
got a bit sloppy at the end I'm tired sorry :)
there u go ;) but what ever this mean its one of the best composed and written songs ever!!
seriously ask Danny Trejo about this ;) Danny Trejo: actor—inmate between 1965 and 1968.
for you to fight your addiction (of our own device). Also it talks about the Master's chambers, and the feast which is considered "encounter groups", stabbing the beast references the disease of addiction. Hotel California is synonymous in recovery with therapeutic communities, TC's and long-term treatment.
On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair
When you go you go alone and you have heard lots of words about how cool the the experience is
Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air
The Marijuana you and the others you are with are smoking while waiting for the effects.
Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light
The first flashes of the effects
My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim
Something weird is happening
I had to stop for the night
The mind can no longer see where it is going
There she stood in the doorway;
The first images beaconing you to enter the experience of LSD. Music (She -The Muse) is probably influencing one altered state of mind
I heard the mission bell
church bell -The LSD experience is very spiritual in nature
all great music is about love or the tragedy that occurs when it is absent (religious context LSD feels like it embodies the real intent of christian church dogma)
And I was thinking to myself,
"This could be Heaven or this could be Hell"
we have been told taking drugs is bad and the intrigue feels like it could be a delusion but the wondrous images and feeling of love seem as if we are entering heaven
Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way
It is very hard to organize one thoughts during the onset but eventually a coherent stream of thought begins to coalesce
she (the muse) music is the best guide in the LSD experience
There were voices down the corridor,
Something begins to catch ones attention. seems there is a form of information reflected onto the mind from the visions
I thought I heard them say...
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place (Such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face
the visions will have you in awe and will reflect LOVE and good feelings
Plenty of room at the Hotel California
there seems to be no limits to one's expanded mind and it's perception of reality.
Any time of year (Any time of year)
You can find it here
This space is always here we just are not aware of it
Her mind is Tiffany-twisted, she got the Mercedes bends.
The visions are like patterns on a tiffany lamp. following the pattern of
the Muse in the poetry of Rock and roll lyrics is like riding in plush vehicle driving you deep into your mind.
She got a lot of pretty, pretty boys she calls friends
Rock Stars who serve the muse.
How they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat.
Rock and Roll show
Some dance to remember, some dance to forget
Who am I? or "Heads all empty without a care"
So I called up the Captain,
Ones god concept
"Please bring me my wine"
He said, "We haven't had that spirit here since nineteen sixty nine"
When we meet again we will share a new wine (sic Bible) (morning glory wine)
Timothy Leary stated at about this time that alcohol is the anti-psychedelic and recommended not mixing them
And still those voices are calling from far away,
It is truly the feeling of entering a far away world and there seems to be a dis-embodied voices in ones mind
Wake you up in the middle of the night
Just to hear them say...
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place (Such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face
The visions will have you in awe most of the time and are leading to pleasing visions of LOVE
They livin' it up at the Hotel California
LSD allows your mind to be released, feeling none of the restraints experienced in the normal state of mind.
What a nice surprise (what a nice surprise)
One discovers that all you need is LOVE
Bring your alibis
Reasons for not loving and or memories of justifications for when one was unkind to another. self judgement phase
Mirrors on the ceiling,
Cant run away from yourself
The pink champagne on ice
relax drink it in be at peace for once.
And she said "We are all just prisoners here, of our own device"
the limits of your mind are the limits on your idea of yourself and life
And in the master's chambers,
LSDs full effect is being felt" Love is confirmed as the force behind Life
They gathered for the feast
Many experience peace "the food of love" the first time in a universal way
They stab it with their steely knives,
Trying to hate something away, it could be in ones own bad idea of them selves this really causes disruption in one mind when sailing on the sea of love
But they just can't kill the beast.
Being overwhelmed with the task of dealing with ones own guilt.
Can't figure out how to communicate the wonder of love to those who don't under stand
The thought that the experience is all just fantasy and the world and it's people are far from understanding truth and Love and will continue justifying there lives at the cost of another's life.
The waking reality enters that the world which does not seem very loving and who is it's master?
If Love is everything, what about war and murderous death and the purveyors of it.
Enter the eater of Love (Bad Trip)
Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
The devil or a dark force must be real and these thoughts are getting pretty scary..
and one might want the experience to end at this time.
"Relax, " said the night man,
"We are programmed to receive.
You can check-out any time you like,
But you can never leave! "
The LSD experience is hard to shake from ones memory
And the idea of ones self will likely be changed forever.
Interpretation by Ron Love
Your Views of Pain and Sweet are shown in every day life as 4th learning our events mark life in true form.
Thank You. Kimberly
"Please bring me my wine"
He said, "We haven't had that spirit here since nineteen sixty nine"
And still those voices are calling from far away,
Wake you up in the middle of the night
Just to hear them say...
The "Captain" could refer to the head of the spirits who are managing this strange after-death, after-life place. Perhaps, the request is for the elixir of life. The word elixir is derived from the Arabic name for miracle substances, "al iksir." Some view it as a metaphor for the spirit of God (e.g. Jesus' reference to "the Water of Life" or "the Fountain of Life") John 4:14 "But whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”. The Scots and the Irish adopted the name for their "liquid gold": the Gaelic name for whiskey is 'uisge beatha', or water of life.
The numeral 1969 is 19 and 69, with this strange after-death, after-life place called Hotel California being in-between the two.
As for Number 19 in Christian Numerology (From 'Biblical Meaning of Numbers' at
http://www.christian-resources-today.com/biblical-meaning-of-numbers.html ) it deals with the perfection of divine order that is in relation to judgment. Or if we take the numbers separately as one and nine for nineteen, we know that the Biblical Meaning of Number One is the number of God. Independence is also attached to this number as well, for it excludes all things that are different. This number is also used when marking the beginnings of things. Unity is very common when defining this number, for it stands alone and cannot be divided.
Additionally, the Biblical meaning of number nine is judgment or finality. Basically, it's used when judging man and all of his works. This number has also been used in Christianity to describe the perfect movement of God. Therefore, in this instance of nine as in nineteen, I prefer to use the latter reference namely, to describe the perfection of God.
Moreover, if you search the entire Holy Quran for the number nineteen written out in Arabic "tisa-ashr", you will find it in one verse:
74:31 "On it (are) nineteen."
The Holy Quran itself explains the significance of the number 19 in the immediately following verse:
74:32 "And We have made the guardians of the Fire to be Angels; and We did not make their number except as a test for those who have rejected, so that those who were given the Scripture would understand, and those who have faith would be increased in faith, and so that those who have been given the Scripture and the believers do not have doubt, and so that those who have a sickness in their hearts and the rejecters would Say: "What did God mean with an example such as this?" It is such that God misguides whom He wishes, and He guides whom He wishes. And none know your Lord's soldiers except Him. And it is but a reminder for mankind."
Thus as 19 is symbolic of Hell, Fire, and its guardians, the avoidance of which requires spiritual guidance, leading to eternal life, and salvation, all of which are created for man who can exercise their free will in this life, according to which his "deeds blossom in the dust".
Also if 19 could signify the creation of Hell, which was necessitated only after creation of beings with free will, then it also signifies the beginning of time as relevant for man, namely the creation of the first Man, Adam (alaihi salam). (I am doubtful whether to insert Abdullah Yusuf Ali's intro to Chapter LXXVI Dhar or Al Insan, where he brings out referring to Einstein's Theory of Relativity that Time is not absolute, and is relative. Also in doubt whether to insert references from scriptures to show that Time will be 'killed' or will-end, and the next-world of timelessness and eternity will begin)
In the numeral sixty nine, the number 6 could stand for the six ages, or aeons, or stages in which the world was created, according to both the Holy Bible and the Holy Quran.
Also the Biblical meaning of number Six is the number of man. This number is also used when referring (human labor) or (secular completeness) This number also is attached when describing the constant battle between spirit and flesh, which was brought out earlier in the quote of the Holy Quran 74:32.
And we have already seen that Biblical Meaning of Number is judgment or finality. Basically, it's used when judging man and all of his works. This number has also been used to describe the perfect movement of God. However, in this instance of nine in sixty-nine I prefer to use the earlier reference namely, of judgment or finality, when judging man and all of his works.
Therefore the meaning in its entirety is that this strange place does not have the elixir once man lost his spiritual existence or paradise, which is the neighborhood of the One God or the one (1), or the Perfect one (9). Having choice of free will, the consequent actions of human beings (6) and deeds in this world are subject to judgement (9), by God, following which man could be designated eternal salvation or eternal perdition, over the latter there being nineteen. Thus the final completion of the cycle by referring again to nineteen where we began, establishes the element of perpetuity and eternity in Hell and Heaven.
And thus the 'voices were calling from far away', cause voices necessarily need not belong to those with bodies, and 'far away' could be in distance or space, or in time and from memory as in a dream... The next line emphasizes more that it could be dream-like, for one can only 'wake up' from sleep and we have already seen sleep as the sister of death, and if sunset of life is death then the endless night stands for after-death. Thus in this after-death time and place, where there is no dimension of time and space, we wake up from our dreamy death-sleep to hear:
Since my college days, I am familiar with the lyrics of this song by Eagles called "Hotel California". However, lately I have been looking at it from a quite different perspective, and I was surprised at what I saw. The opening stanza is:
"On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair
Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air
Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light
My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim
I had to stop for the night"
On a dark desert highway,
The 'dark desert highway' is the highway of our life. It is dark and in the desert for when we are close to death or are dying, we are in the dusk or sunset of our life, and also alone, for those whom we leave behind have to tarry some more time in the world.
cool wind in my hair
Having been tormented by the pain and agony of death, death itself is a relief from the pain, and so our sweating brow and head will feel 'cool wind', however warm the desert breeze might be, because of the evaporation of the deathly sweat.
Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air
By 'Colitas', the writers of the song tell us they are referring to 'little buds', and when we are dying, we can see a flash back of our life, memories running fast through our mind, from which the sweet aroma of our good deeds that we had done will rise up in the air and spread its fragrance, long after we are gone. Like the poet James Shirley in his poem "Death the Leveller" writes: "Only the actions of the just. Smell sweet and blossom in the dust"
Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light
The shimmering light ahead in the distance, could well be the abode for the dead. The spiritual space between life and after-life. It could for those who believe in Heaven and Hell be its shimmering light, beckoning, a beacon to all the souls, a destination for ever. Thus the Holy Quran states:
Truly Hell is a place of Ambush. For the transgressors a place of destination: they will dwell therein for ages. Holy Quran Chapter 78: 21 to 23
My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim
As one passes on from life to death, the last signs of life ebb away from the worn out body. As with sleep, so with death, the head grows heavy, for death is but an endless sleep till resurrection (See Walter Toman wrote 'No Resurrection? Only Endless Sleep' http://www.sgipt.org/e/lit/toman_e.htm ). Moreover, as we know in sleep, it is only the body that sleeps, while the part of mind not in the dominion of sleep, roams in the space less and timeless place of dreams. So also in death, it is only the body that dies, but the spirit, free of its bodily cage, lives on eternally.
I had to stop for the night
Also, any medico will tell us that the eyes, or the reaction of pupils in the eye, show us the last sign of life. Therefore, the sight grows dim in the dying. And then when the day of our life is done, we have to but stop for the night.
The second stanza continues:
There she stood in the doorway;
I heard the mission bell
And I was thinking to myself,
"This could be Heaven or this could be Hell"
Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way
There were voices down the corridor,
I thought I heard them say...
For me the first two lines of the second stanza signify someone who receives us at the entrance into the strange land at death. With the mission bell sounding the time when we give up our ghost, we have arrived. But where, we know not! For, when we die, certainly we would all be wondering, whether the place we are being led to is Heaven or Hell.
The candle is lit up by the one who welcomes, and being a candle only lights up things near, and we can discern only a corridor... Even the voices coming down the corridor the listener thinks he hears they are welcoming him/her to this strange "Hotel California" with these words that form the chorus:
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place (Such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face
Plenty of room at the Hotel California
Any time of year (Any time of year)
You can find it here
The chorus on Hotel California extolling it as a "lovely place", is because it is not of this world. Also, because all of us must land up there after death, when we do not have our bodies, and do not require physical space, there would naturally be "plenty of room at the Hotel California". Here it will help us if we remember that souls are spiritual, made of light, and do not occupy physical space. And so, let's examine the third stanza which says:
Her mind is Tiffany-twisted, she got the Mercedes Benz
She got a lot of pretty, pretty boys she calls friends
How they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat.
Some dance to remember, some dance to forget
In the third stanza we learn that our hostess is good-looking with many pretty companions as friends. Specifically, the usage of "pretty" as an adjective for boys could be to signify that since souls lack bodies, and therefore sex and gender, adjectives appropriate for females can be as appropriate for males too.
So I called up the Captain,
"Please bring me my wine"
He said, "We haven't had that spirit here since nineteen sixty nine"
And still those voices are calling from far away,
Wake you up in the middle of the night
Just to hear them say...
The "Captain" could refer to the head of the spirits who are managing this strange after-death, after-life place. Perhaps, the request is for the elixir of life. The word elixir is derived from the Arabic name for miracle substances, "al iksir." Some view it as a metaphor for the spirit of God (e.g. Jesus' reference to "the Water of Life" or "the Fountain of Life") John 4:14 "But whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”. The Scots and the Irish adopted the name for their "liquid gold": the Gaelic name for whiskey is 'uisge beatha', or water of life.
The numeral 1969 is 19 and 69, with this strange after-death, after-life place called Hotel California being in-between the two. Search the entire Holy Quran for the number nineteen written out in Arabic "tisa-ashr", you will find it in one verse:
74:31 "On it (are) nineteen."
The Holy Quran itself explains the significance of the number 19 in the immediately following verse:
74:32 "And We have made the guardians of the Fire to be Angels; and We did not make their number except as a test for those who have rejected, so that those who were given the Scripture would understand, and those who have faith would be increased in faith, and so that those who have been given the Scripture and the believers do not have doubt, and so that those who have a sickness in their hearts and the rejecters would Say: "What did God mean with an example such as this?" It is such that God misguides whom He wishes, and He guides whom He wishes. And none know your Lord's soldiers except Him. And it is but a reminder for mankind."
Therefore while 19 talks of spiritual guidance, eternal life, and salvation, the number 69 as we all know refers to a symbolic representation of physical life, namely the sexual union, which requires material bodies. Therefore the meaning in its entirety is that this strange place does not have the elixir once man lost his spiritual existence or paradise or 19, and gained his physical one, as life in this world, coming into it from the union of the sperm and ova.
And thus the 'voices were calling from far away', cause voices necessarily need not belong to those with bodies, and 'far away' could be in distance or space, or in time and from memory as in a dream... The next line emphasizes more that it could be dream-like, for one can only 'wake up' from sleep and we have already seen sleep as the sister of death, and if sunset of life is death then the endless night stands for after-death. Thus in this after-death time and place, where there is no dimension of time and space, we wake up from our dreamy death-sleep to hear:
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place (Such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face
They livin' it up at the Hotel California
What a nice surprise (what a nice surprise)
Bring your alibis
The last three lines of the second chorus is a shade different from the first occurrence of the chorus. Herein the reference is to everyone 'living it up', and one can only 'live it up' in your after life, if you deserved it through your deeds in this one. Thus after all the sacrifices, and the hardship, the patience and the perseverance involved in following the straight and narrow, dark and desert highway, the living it up comes as a just and "nice surprise". The seconds voice, namely the last line of the chorus reminds that we bring our past deeds as our 'alibis', as the poet James Shirley, wrote, "Only the actions of the just. Smell sweet and blossom in their dust. "
Mirrors on the ceiling,
The pink champagne on ice
And she said "We are all just prisoners here, of our own device"
And in the master's chambers,
They gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives,
But they just can't kill the beast
We look up, yearning for salvation, but see "mirrors on the ceiling" mirrors which shows the past memories of all our life's deeds. And we are more concerned amongst our deeds about those punk ones that we put on ice, like the punk band "Pink Champagne". These questionable acts, of which we are so much in doubt, bind us in chains, so that we are " all just prisoners here, of our own device". Interesting to see the lyrics of 'Abandon All Ships' that says: "The binding chains made me realize. Sin is the anchor, holding you down. I'm on a cruise to Paradise." the same thought of sinner as a prisoner is in 89:26 of the Holy Quran which states: "And none will bind as He will bind." the same idea is also represented in 76:4 of the Holy Quran, which states: "For the Rejecters we have prepared chains, yokes, and a blazing Fire."
If we take "Pink Champagne" to be a variety of drink, though I prefer not, as we know that 'the fountain' and 'cups full of drink' are for the righteous in the personification of Heaven, for which there are numerous references as in the Holy Quran:
76:5 "As to the Righteous, they shall drink of a Cup (of Wine) mixed with Camphor."
Sins bind the sinner in a chain of causes and effects, due to which he loses his free will to repent, amend and follow the right guidance and ultimately destroys himself in the blazing fire of punishment. On the other hand the righteous who have surrendered their free will to the will of Allah and followed His right guidance will have wholesome, agreeable and refreshing drinks which do not cause intoxication. Camphor is cool and refreshing like ice. Moreover, there is a reference in the same chapter of the Holy Quran:
76:17 And they will be given to drink there of a Cup (of Wine) mixed with Zanjabil,-
76:18 A fountain there, called Salsabil.
Then they gather in the "master's chambers", and he or she could be the guardian, captain, head, leader of this strange Hotel, and it is a festival, or a "feast", that they are "living it up", and "trying to kill the beast", about which God says in the Holy Quran,
“And when the Word (of torment) is fulfilled against them, We shall bring out from the earth a beast to them, which will speak to them because mankind believed not with certainty in Our Signs” (al-Naml 27:82).
This verse refers to the beast of the earth who will appear shortly before the Day of Judgment. When the Beast comes, it will distinguish the people and declare who is a believer and who is a disbeliever.
Also, there are many Biblical references in Daniel's prophecies of the Reveleation, but I think they are not of life after death. Yet for knowledge sake, the literal references for the beasts in Revelation are:
Revelation 11:7 – the beast that comes up out of the abyss.
Revelation 12:3 – the red dragon (seven heads and ten horns)
Revelation 12:9 – the dragon (Satan)
Revelation 13:1 – a beast that comes up out of the sea (seven heads and ten horns).
Revelation 13:11 – Another beast (the false prophet)
Revelation 17:3 – a red beast (seven heads and ten horns) comes up out of the abyss.
Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
"Relax, " said the night man,
"We are programmed to receive.
You can check-out any time you like,
But you can never leave! "
When the bell of remembrance strikes in us, we shall realize it in our inmost being, how we had wasted all our past life in the illusions of this fleeting world. Then we shall remember, and wish, too late, that we had repented as said in the Holy Quran:
89:23 And hell is made to appear that day.On that day man will be mindful, and of what use will being mindful be then?
89:24 He will say: O would that I had sent before for (this) my life!
Thus, we try to find the passage back to walk the dark and desert highway of life once more, doing all the good. But the night man is ever watchful. Once dead, we cannot return. So, Why not repent now? Why not bring forth the fruits of repentance now, as a preparation for this Hereafter of which we have had a graphic look at, thanks to the Eagles?
- Essa Mohamed Rafique
Hard at times to Understand, Just a Stepping Stone. To Become What WE Believe IN.
Thank You, The lyrics are in tru form..
Just get up and go, no one can hold you hostage, but an addiction can. That's the official answer!
Allways room in hotel cali.
Sweet summer sweat.
We forget the courtyard .
As we remember our sub con shis as she or he Lives,Love ,and finally Learns.
What complete s us.
Enjoy lifes short passages , for the doors are programed.*
These excesses encoded in the lyrics therefore could very well be a reference to part of this dark underbelly, illicit drug use, in particular opiates. 'Relax said the nightman, we are programmed to "receive" could be referring to the fact that in every human body there are many opiate "receptors" mainly in the brain, the spinal chord, and the digestive tract.
They are part of the "human endogenous morphine" or "endorphin" system. They also respond to drugs such as Opium, heroin, and other opiates.
"You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave" could be describing the fact that you can try to wean yourself off them, but your body ultimately will always be willing and able to absorb these substances.
Maybe even abut the moonlanding.
Also County lockup is sometimes called "Hotel California".
Oh well, the point is, it's a great song. The lyrics are just... amazing!
Another metaphor that I like is that Hotel California is something representing addiction to drug. Because people can use drug but can hardly quit it. Likewise, you can check in Hotel California but you can’t never leave it. As someone has mentioned below, H may be abbreviation of Heroin , while C may represents Cocaine.
Much loooove.
In my mind- it's a rooming house. He enters, there's a beautiful woman showing him to her room. As he goes inside, it's disgusting. Horrible how these people can subcuum themselves to this for drugs, or lack of money due to their lack of taking care of their responsibilities.
Plenty of room because no one wants to live there. The place used to be a hotel, so when asks for the wine, they laugh at him and say it hasn't been like that since before Vietnam.
Her mind is tiffany twisted, meaning she's drunk. She's got a bendz because she turns tricks, hence the pretty boys she calls friends. She has a bendz but can't live anywhere else because she spends all her money to look good and get high.
Mirrors on the ceiling for her customers. They puthemselves in the situation, that's why their there on their own devices. The beast the tenants are trying to kill is their vices, the pain and heartache, guilt, anger, and hole they've gotten themselves into. They work with each other because they've shut everyone else out. (This isn't about all people that live in rooming houses, I'm just interpreting the song, and just got out of a situation so much similiar to it, so my mind is conjoining with it.)
He can't leave, symbolizes him bringing himself there and staying too long and getting in a sense stuck there. That's why they said you can check out whenever but you can't leave.
That's my input, like I said, just upgraded from a rooming house to an apartment, and I'm telling you yo, that s--t aint cute at all. That s--t was hard. Been through a lot, a lot was in there, feel me. I can feel it in my heart that's what this song about. Just an opinion, though,
You can check-out any time you like, but you can never leave. (DREAMING or falling asleep IN THE PENETENTIARY) you rented a room at the hotel CA! he tells the Captain TO PLEASE BRING HIM HIS WINE-{FLAVORED DRINK}EXAMPLE PRISON KOOL AID LOL. so the cap sez " we havent had that SPIRIT since 69 . lol as in wine and spiritual cheer in gloomy places. as told by a friend who was locked up there with freaks queens etc . he tried to escape, mentally he cant leave physically--Illumadept, Dallas TX
She tells him to just go to the window cause she can't figure out WHAT he's talking about. He's not sure of what she said to him now and doesn't drive even a foot and she hears the 'mission bell' of a new customer inside on her headpiece and he thinks he hears some people talking in the background saying 'Welcome to....' but it's actually only her again. To read more of my interpretation of this song just buy my new book entitled 'Crazy outlandish presumptions about classic songs'. Its probably the best book out there that attempts to interpret lyrics using a very literal and rigid set of guidelines that only adhere to one running thread of questionable logic.
"HOW I KNOW THE ANSWER TO THIS? LMAO CUZZ MY MOM WAS LOCKED UP IN THIS BEAUTIFUL PLACE...IT WAS A REAL PLACE...A HOTEL...A HOSPITAL..AND A WOMENS PRISON...The building now housing California Rehabilitation Center opened in 1928 as the Lake Norconian Club, a luxury hotel. In December 1941, President F. D. Roosevelt turned the resort into a Naval hospital. The hospital first closed in November 1949, reopened in 1950 during the Korean War, then closed again in June 1957. In March 1962, the federal government donated the facility to the state to use as a narcotics center. To help ease overcrowding in the 1980s, CRC began housing felons as well as civil narcotic addicts.
- MONDEAU, CHULA VISTA, CA"
refrences in the song that support this view are
-he was lead there by the warm smell of Colitas meaning "little buds" or marijuana
-saying that they havent had wine since 1969
but they have pink champagne which is a strain of Chrystal methamphetamine and is emphasized by saying that its on "ice" a common term for the drug which was a rampant problem in the san diego area after 1969 and continues to be today
-they are all prisoners of their own device
-stabbing the beast with their steely knives a reference to "slamming" or injecting narcotics to avoid withdrawal
-there is a night-man
-they are programed to recieve
Just how "Her mind is tiffany-twisted, she got the mercedes bends" fits into hell though, I'm not quite sure...
This is about Government Sponsored Health Care.
Hey!!! You're right!!! Whoever said you can interpret this song in a myriad of ways was correct. "You can check out any time you like, but you can't never leave!!!" Clearly, once the Government gets ahold of Healthcare, we'll NEVER be able to go back to a system (albeit flawed) that sorta worked, to a system that really won't work for ANYONE...unless of course, you're high up in the government or connected to those dopes.
The Eagles were more than 30 years ahead of their time.
courtney san antonio tx
She's got lots of pretty pretty boys she calls friends..Gays are often thought of as friends by girls.
How they dance in the court yard, sweet summer sweat...Many gays danced at tea party's in the 80's.
Relax said the night man we are programmed to receive, many gays crave as as in a sexual act to recieve rather the give.
How they gathered for the feast..usually in gay bathhouse there was AN ORGY ROOM.
Just so you know, a song can mean ANYTHING YOU WANT IT TO!!!
Who gives a damn what the writer says? It's like the picture with two faces kissing or a vase. If you WANT it to be about drugs, it's about drugs. If you WANT it to be about sex, it's about sex. Hell, it can even be about FACEBOOK!!! So in the end, when you get right down to it, the song is whatever the listener wants it to be.
Cool wind in my hair
The warm smell of colitas
Rising up through the air(driving felling bomb smokin a little bud)
Up ahead in the distance
I saw a shimmering light
My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim
I had to stop for the night(first time trying heroin he desides to keep doing it for a little bitt)
There she stood in the doorway
I heard the mission bell
And I was thinking to myself
This could be heaven or this could be hell
Then she lit up a candle
And she showed me the way(girl showd him on to it,he wasnt sure if he should or not)
There were voices down the corridor
I thought I heard them say
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place, such a lovely face
There's plenty of room at the Hotel California
Any time of year, you can find it here
Her mind is definitely twisted
She's got her Mercedes Benz
She's got a lotta pretty, pretty boys
That she calls friends
How they dance in the courtyard
Sweet summer sweat
Some dance to remember
Some dance to forget(she loves material items,shes got some other guys hooked,how they trip in the court yard.Some use it to remember the past, others use it to forget the past...)
So I called up the captain(The dealer)
Please bring me my wine(hes asking for some bud.)
He said "We haven't had that spirit here since 1969"(nobodey is doing that any more)
And still those voices they're calling from far away
Wake you up in the middle of the night
Just to hear them say(Shakes,cant live with out it)
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place, such a lovely face
They're livin' it up at the Hotel California
What a nice surprise, bring your alibis
Mirrors on the ceilling, the pink champaign on ice
And she said "We are all just prisoners here of our own device"(self explanatory...)
In the masters chambers they're gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knifes but they just can't kill the beast(they shoot up but the addiction is makeing them want more and more..)
Last thing I remember, I was runnin' for the door
I had to find the passage back to the place I was before(He comes to his scenes)
"Relax " said the night man "We are programmed to receive
You can check out anyytime you like, but you can never leave" Thats f--ked up...)
austin dotson
READ!
Especially the line about never leaving.
Eagles for sharing with me their artistic talents. Snow
"but they just cant kill the beast" translate meaning "they just cant break their addiction"
"you can check in any time you like but you can never leave" translate "once you try drugs you cant quit" come on it's common sense
Question: Where were you?
Line: On a dark desert highway
Q: Whatcha smell?
L: Warm smell of colitas
Q: Whatcha see?
L: I saw a shimmering light
Q: Whatcha do?
L: I had to stop for the night
Q: Where'd she stand?
L: There she stood in the doorway
Q: Whatcha hear?
L: I heard the mission bells
And you get the idea...it goes thru the entire song like this. I saw the whole thing printed out once about 20 years ago and haven't seen it since. Would love to find this...Thx, Teresa :-)
Ooops, hang on, I just slipped in born-again bible-basher mode. [click] ... and back to normal now ...
Having just read Don Felder's book "Heaven and Hell", I must agree with Frey's explanation that the song is about the dark under-belly of LA. So many people are quick to assume it's about heroin but like so many succesful bands of the time, they were into cocaine.
BTW, I think the "Mercedes bends" refers to the light-headedness of the Hollywood lifestyle at the time ... as in the decompression sickness that divers get when resurfacing too quickly.
It is also one of the most over-dubbed pieces of studio production at the time, with folklore suggesting 8 or more guitar tracks.
PS I think it's a masterpiece!
the more that the lyrics to say is that the same drugs is a dead end!
Be HAPPY!
Be HAPPY!
The album cover photo was taken there. Back in the 80's I took the album there and put it up to the site where it was taken and it was indeed not just similar, but actually THE place. Listen to the lyrics and you will see it's about being institutionalized in a mental hospital. No doubt about it.
http://www.todossantos-baja.com/todos-santos/eagles/hotel-where.htm
Sheep.
I can't tell you what the writer intended for this Song; but I can tell you from my own experience what I believe the song to be about. When I was 16 years old I was severely depressed and attempted suicide. When the privately owned hospital I was first sent to could not help me they sent me to Camarillo. This was in 1989 and the hospital has since closed down so I can see why kids who go out there for a spooky time would have to walk about a mile to get to the
actual hospital grounds. Here is my interpretation of the lyrics based on my experiences from beginning to end...
On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair
Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air
(I was taken to Camarillo via ambulance and to get there you had to drive down a deserted highway with a strong smell from the plant life that surrounded you from all directions. I later learned that this was ideal for the
hospital staff because they would warn of all the animals that would likely kill us before we got to the city if we tried to escape the hospital.)
Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light
My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim
I had to stop for the night
(The paramedic gave me an injection of some sort of sedative just prior to arriving at the hospital so that I would be easier to examine and question for the intake process. This of course caused heavy headedness and dimming vision.)
There she stood in the doorway; (there was a female nurse to do the intake)
I heard the mission bell (I was told the hospital use to be a mission and there were indeed bells that rang out)
And I was thinking to myself,
'This could be Heaven or this could be Hell'
(I thought the same thing. I was told that this hospital was going to be able to take the pain of the depression away from me but at the same time it was daunting, scary and overwhelming and I felt trapped)
Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way
There were voices down the corridor,
I thought I heard them say...
(There were several different buildings that housed thousands of different patients ranging from the mental depression like mine to the criminally insane that had murdered people and
as I was taken to my building I heard people murmuring and chanting all along. When she brought me to the ward I was to spend the next 8 months at I was again asked lots of questions
by the staff and there were certainly voices down the corridor, some welcoming, some shrieking warnings to run while I still
could.)
Her mind is Tiffany-twisted, she got the Mercedes-Benz
(My mind was certainly twisted and as for the Mercedes-benz, when you are new you are the cream of the crop, everyone wants to know your story and they want to be close to you)
She got a lot of pretty, pretty boys, that she calls friends
(again, all the boys want to know who the new girl is)
How they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat.
(We had dances in the courtyard at least once a month and it was always warm like summertime)
Some dance to remember, some dance to forget
(obviously some wanted to remember how they were before they lost their minds, others wanted to forget what they had done to get them here to this place)
So I called up the Captain,
(The head nurse was usually referred to as shift Captain)
'Please bring me my wine'
He said, 'We haven't had that spirit here
Since nineteen sixty nine'
(This part I have only heard about, but I was told that the patients would be given wine to help them sleep at night up until 1969)
And still those voices are calling from far away,
Wake you up in the middle of the night
Just to hear them say...
(If it weren't the voices that some of them heard in their own heads it was the voices from the other units where patients seemed to never stop screaming or chanting)
Mirrors on the ceiling,
(There was a room where we were taken if we
acted out and became an immediate danger to
ourselves or others, it had a mirror that was really a two way mirror they used to observe us while in the room)
The pink champagne on ice
And she said 'We are all just prisoners here, of our own device
(Each patient had their own "device" or disease, diagnosis)
And in the master's chambers,
They gathered for the feast
The stab it with their steely knives
But they just can't kill the beast
(This reminds me again of the room we were taken to when acting out, we were strapped to a bed and shot up with thorazine to calm us down. They 'stabbed' us with the needle (steely knife)
to inject the thorazine, but it was always temporary. For some, no drug or therapy ever 'killed the beast' of mental illness.)
Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
(It came to a point where I just wanted to be back in the private owned hospital or even back at home with my demons but it wasn't to be)
'Relax,' said the night man,
We are programmed to receive.
You can checkout any time you like,
but you can never leave!
(I was lucky, but the majority of patients at
Camarillo State Hospital truly could never leave)
THE ILLUMINATI are keeping away from you with false information:
In order to understand this song you need to be aware of certain things. you have to know that the world is run by royal family´s since we started this game of life. U see we created this world for our consciousness to play in and we let ourselves forget that this life is just tricking god into believing that it is just a mortal human. The royal family sadly knows this truth since the Roman times and have been keeping it away from us (the peasants) ever since. They want us to worship them and their corrupt popes.
anyway the song is full of metaphors and i´m not gonna translate them word by word for u. i´m just gonna put u on the right direction.
The song is basically saying that our consciousness is in big trouble because we cannot just stop the game of life, cause there´s no god except us. and because of royal familys greed this life is a virtual prison for our consciousness. u see money is just a tool to make others follow YOUR WILL and the ones with the money (the 'royals' ) own ALL the money thus all the will
that´s why there are so many williams in the 'royal' family WILL.I.AM.
they call themselfes royals with BLUE BLOOD but their blood is no more blue then HANNIBAL LECTERS.
Jack Green from HI, "I would have to disagree with your statment: . But I dont mean to say your idea is bad; it is, actually, metaphorically brilliant, but I dont thihnk the Eagles could have realistically written anything like that." They did. This song, take it as you want, is full of only that: metaphors.
Though I do not exactly know what the song is about: hell, drugs, sex addiction, car crashes, or an actual place, I do know that no one knows for sure but the ones who wrote it.
It would be amazing if they did, but look, years later this song is still one of the greatest rock songs of all times. I am only eighteen years old, and I must say that it is my favorite.
Hotel California is full of mystery, and when you hear this song, you get lost within the words, and that is what good music is all about. Making you strive to be there, to see what they see, you get high within the talent of just ordinary men rocking out. You strive to be in their minds for just one moment.
I totally agree on the addiction Story. it could not be clearer.But how nice this Song is, it reminds you so much of the sad fact, taht indeed, you can check out anytime, but you can never leave...and sometimes you want to dance to remember....
AMEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Although I still do believe their meaning to the song.
But I Am totally with you on your message!
God is the answer and the key to our salvation. Without him, I'd be lost. I'd have no purpose.
I am so grateful I have him in my life...
Not only was it brilliant metaphorically and lyrically, but the chord progression is frightening in the way that it holds the listener, particularly the outro solo as both players trace the arpeggios and cycle them into eternity. I first heard the song as a child and it still haunts me, to the point that I had to learn how to play it in the belief that if I understood what was happening in terms of musical theory, it would free me from the emotional free-associations happening whenever the song played. It didn't work.
This led to this, and that led to the that, and they ended up at the Church of Satan just in time to watch a ceremony among its members. They mingled with the church parishoners, got to know them and what they were about, and witnessed a beast sacrifice.
The Church of Satan preaches excessive living, enjoy yourself, pleasure yourself, do what makes you happy and don't feel guilty about it: The American Dream.
The Hotel California
That scares me for multiple reasons, but I know I'm NOT afraid of the reaper. Iused to quote this song up and down my planner when I was in middleshool. (still am) and the solo is one of the greatest ever.
As powerful anything
The song is probably about materialism. I also think it could be about drug rehab at Camerillo State Hospital. Glenn Fry & company did have various drug problems.
There is supposed to be a corpse propped up in a window shown on the album cover. As for Satantic messages when played backward, that is just one of those anomolies that happen sometimes.
- Kelli, San Antonio, TX
The above is the most captivating explanation I've heard. From an old Vietnam Vet with some problems left over from that place-----It touches home and seems to make sense. I heard this song on the way home from work tonight for the first time in a lot of years. Listening to the song I begin to wonder what it was all about. My mind involuntarily rushed back to '68 and '69. I was in Nam. Nam experiences just kept rolling through my mind. When I got home, I could not get the thing out of my mind and searched the meaning of this song. Kelli of San Antonio posted this way towards the top. And it seemed to ring very loud in my mind. The big difference I hold is the meaning of the line "they stab it with their steely knives but they just can't kill the beast," is a reference to the beastly war and the things witnessed and done. We just can't make the memories go away.
Bill---Dallas, Texas
You can check-out any time you like,
But you can never leave!'" is also a reference to the Silicon Revolution saying that you can decide that you don't want a materialistic life-style but you can never truly leave it behind you.
I just got through reading your thoughts on the song, and while I do not disagree with everything I must say when I first started reading it I thought it was brilliant. As I read on, however, it just felt like you started stretching it to much. The whole thing about the woman being a metaphor for the drug, and the mercedes and all that stuff...it was like fitting an elephant into a phone booth if u know what I mean. Were the Eagles that brilliant? I highly doubt their intention was anything like what you described. But I dont mean to say your idea is bad; it is, actually, metaphorically brilliant, but I dont thihnk the Eagles could have realistically written anything like that. If anything I think they are more literal, but I do agree that it is about heroine and therefore require alot of metaphors. And I also do not fully believe what Henley said when he declared that it was about materialism.
When I was stationed in San Diego at Balboa Hospital, a friend beckoned me to the fifth floor window, and asked me what I saw. It was sunset, and the view was eerily similar to the Album cover. I was told the Navy denied all connections with the song or its lyrics. (Now, call me silly, but if they really did deny it, doesn't that usually mean there is SOME truth to it??)
Since that time, whenever I listen to the song, I hear a story about military men disabled in Viet Nam and being "cared for" at Balboa Hospital.
Some dance to remember, some dance to forget, to me, is the perfect artistic depiction of what veterans of gruesome wars go through. It sends chills up my spine every time.
There is a mission in San Diego, and every once in a while you could hear the bells from the hospital.
The line, they stab it with their steely knives but they just kill the beast, in my mind, refers to communism, and the enemy in general.
You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave - what a perfect ending!! Checking out could either refer to leaving the hospital but always needing to come back, or... checking out as in orders to come home, but your mind is still back in country.
Of course there is the "official" story that the song was written about hedonism in So Cal. But like any fine art form, one gets from it what one can relate to.
a) I am not Christian, so I can't identify with the meaning behind those related explanations for the lyrics;
b) I know there is more to it than just a discussion of sexual temptation, because sex is something that can be shaken off if necessary, and the famous line that ties the song together is "you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave";
and c) I have been battling opiate addiction for a couple years now and it's a very intense, dark thing that has been dominating within me, so I am predisposed to reading between the lines for illustrations of different affairs with this drug.
These references no longer seem subtle to me, but blatantly blare a portrayal of this man"s encounter with heroin.
Hear me out, if you pleaaseee:
The first two lines "on a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair, warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air" depicts a man riding freely, which is an important contrast to the reality of heroin addiction, which very much locks you in. Before encountering the "Hotel California" he is able to travel with no strings attached, and at the same time he can appreciate the natural beauty of the world through his senses--the warm smell of colitas--because he is not yet intoxicated by the false euphoria that heroin fronts.
The "shimmering light" is the glinting temptation of trying an opiate... the romantic desire to feel out the sensation of ecstasy that it boasts.
The idea of his head growing heavy and sight growing dim describes his inability to be keen/smart and ignore the temptation, The fact that his sight is dim shows that he has narrowed his sights on the idea of doing this drug. The fact that he was on a dark, barren highway relates to his desire to seek refuge at this "shimmering light" because, although he had freedom, he may have been lonely or depressed, seeking a way to improve his situation with light and warmth. (When you do heroin, warmth rushes through your veins..) However, the head growing heavy and sight growing dim also foreshadows the encounter with heroin cause they are both immediate/literal, and long-term/figurative effects of the drug.
The seductive woman is clearly representative of the temptation of using heroin, and the superficial beauty of the opiate. The line "there she stood in the doorway" shows the initial way that heroin latches into his vulnerability" The "doorway" represents where he is vulnerable and exposed; the entrance through which heroin can figuratively sink its teeth into a person's soul and lifestyle. The fact that he thinks "this could be heaven or this could be hell" shows his uncertainty right from the beginning; his reservations about indulging in this, and the fact that he can sense it is the vehicle of some evil. But, like a woman can seduce a man with her looks and body, even when the man is aware of reasons he should not engage with her, he still is weak to her beckoning.
Then she "lit up a candle" and she "shows him the way", and he submits to the call of heroin. The lighting of the candle falls in line with the shimmering light that represented the drug earlier, and it is reminiscent of the words "shoot up" (lit up) or the concept of melting the heroine in order to shoot it up.
The voices singing the chorus—down the corridor (in the distance, beyond reality)— are figments of the rush of the world of heroin into his mind and his imagination and his bloodstream; Welcoming him to the alleged "beauty" of it. The "lovely place/face" boasts the superficial bliss and attraction of heroin" like the woman who represents its beauty on the surface. The fact that there is "Plenty of room at the Hotel California" just emphasizes the fact that anybody can be dragged into the dark slump that this drug insists upon with it"s abusers. While the woman represents temptation and the apparent greatness of heroin, hotel California represents this figurative place wherein all heroin addicts are imprisoned.
"Any time of year you can find it here" It refers maybe literally to heroin" you can always get it in plenty, or "it" could represent the façade of heroin"s perfection and comfort" if anybody is feeling in desperation or lonely—like the central man in these lyrics may have been at first—they can find comfort here.
The sing-song quality of the chorus, and these voices singing this tune makes it seem almost eerie and as if they are collectively brainwashed. The fact that all of these people live alone off this desert highway shows how heroin addicts cling to each other for justification, and they isolate themselves from regular society, so that they can entertain this dream world.
The fact that he "thought" he heard them say these lyrics shows that it is still unreal to him, and that the world of heroin is surreal.
The description of the woman and her twisted world in the second verse is a depiction of how heroin makes one believe that their life is better because of all these superficial feelings, so the lyrics are stocked with material images" "Tiffany-twisted" shows her mind being warped by this material designer, and the Mercedes. The boys that she plays around with shows the fact that she isn"t loyal or giving back the people she tempts, she doesn"t owe anything to them, and she has them at her disposal" she doesn"t call them anything but "friends". This relates to the fact that people sort of have this love affair with heroin, but it is a Drug, an inanimate object that doesn"t feel back.
The "dance" represents using heroin" they dance with her" and some people use drugs for different reasons" some dance with her to remember how good it feels to be with her (to be using the drug) and some use it to forget how it feels not to be (to avoid the real, sober world)
When he calls for wine, and the captain responds saying "we haven"t had that spirit since 1969" it relates to the fact that heroin and alcohol don"t mix, and heroin is a depressant in that it makes you drowsy and cozy, while alcohol inspires energy and the partying spirit that embodied the 1960"s. After the 1960"s, during the "70"s and the 80"s was when both punk music and heroin blew up, I believe, so by the time this song was written, it might be that the party spirit of alcohol had settled into a heroin epidemic.
The voices (heroin"s advertisement) waking you in the middle of the night relates to the fact that when you are using, if you don"t sleep on heroin, you can"t sleep" you wake up in the middle of the night, sweating hot & cold, needing it.
The different ending to the second chorus, saying "bring your alibis" may signify the idea that you should put everything into it, and trust the wonder and enchantment of the drug.
Mirrors on the ceiling" yes for sex, but also sort of like keeping one in check, from up above.
"We are all just prisoners here of our own device" is one of the strongest lines relating this song to heroin abuse" because you really do imprison yourself there, and hold yourself down as a victim of the drug. In the master"s chambers, they gather for the "feast" which is a feast of the drug, a place where everyone comes to fix themselves into a high.
"They stab it with their steely knives" represents the addicts trying to kill what they have come to believe as uncomfortable, depressed sobriety. The aggressive word "stab" gets at that emotion. Their steely knives are their needles and syringes. "But they just can"t kill the beast" the beast has a dual meaning here" it half means the beast of sobriety, and it half means the beast of heroin addiction, and the fact that shooting up again doesn"t actually fully bring satisfacton. This dual meaning, and heavy contradiction embodies the nature of the struggle of heroin addiction.
In the last verse, the man tries to get out while he still can, and enact that power in himself to get back to the place he was before, when he was naïve and innocent to the feeling and danger and darkness of heroin, and the night man says to him" "You can check out any time you like" as in: Sure, you can stop doing it, go through withdrawl and physically be done with it; "but you can never leave", in your heart and your mind, you will always crave it, you can never leave, it is forever embedded in your mind, heart and soul.
Scary as f**k. Never do heroin or OxyContin, Please.
"stabbed it with their steely knives, but they just can't kill the beast" -- steely knives is a thin needle, a syringe, made of medical steel of course, used to inject the drug. And the beast is the drug itself.
"her mind is tiffany-twisted, she got the mercedes bends" -- i dont know what bends is, but Benz is obviously a play on words reflecting their materialism. her mind is twisted because she is addicted to heroine, but also to materialism (because of their wealth). "she got a lotta pretty boys that she calls friends" obviously this is a little exaggerated and sarcastic. Basically, she sleeps around with other rich guys on her drug-infused sex drive.
"you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave / we are programmed to receive" this of course is a direct attention to heroine, or any drug for that matter. They can check out any time, but they can never leave their addiction, and the drug "programs" them to receive it. Absolutely brilliant song. While I'm not sure my interpretation is fully correct, something tells me the artists (the band) wouldn't just reveal the full secret of what the song meant. I mean, if I were them, I wouldn't!
Anyway, stop typing in caps, it won't change mine or anyone else's mind about the meaning. Listen to the lyrics: "We are programmed to receive," and "We are all just prisoners here of our own device." While I can understand how you comprehend the song as being about drugs, I comprehend it as some kind of horror story about technological takeovers. I have heard it said that the song has no meaning, but it's all in the comprehension. I know I'm not changing your mind, all I'm trying to do is give you all the way I pick it up.
Mainly, though, the lyrics of Hotel California are about listening to Hotel California. Specifically the song deals with the internal conflict that arises from hearing a great song come on the radio in an otherwise rubbish playlist at the exact moment when you were about to go to the toilet.
-just adding my 2 cents
It is without doubt the best song of all time.
Angela. Sunderland,England.
Here?s where its gets pretty obvious?. ?Mirrors on the ceiling,
The pink champagne on ice
And she said "We are all just prisoners here, of our own device"
And in the master's chambers,
They gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives,
But they just can't kill the beast?
Prisoners of our own device refers to the fact that everyone succumbs to their most inate desires of lust. The ?feast? is the sex, They stab it with their steely knives, but they just cant kill the beast. They screw to quench their thirst for lust, but in the end all it does is make them want more.
Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
"Relax," said the night man,
We are programmed to receive.
You can checkout any time you like,
but you can never leave!
Here is basically after he?s done and he has that feeling of ?what have I done?. He runs out but before he does, a guy basically tells him, you can leave this place, but this place will never leave you. Henley was embarrassed that he sought comfort from a prostitute and this song was a way of purging his mind of it.
However, (since all songwriters leave interpretation of their songs up to the listener)to me it has always been about a man dying in a car crash (from falling asleep at the wheel) and ending up in Purgatory (the Hotel). Please bear in mind two things as you read the following interpretation of the song. 1. This is the way I have pictured the song in my head (like a video) since I first heard it as a kid. 2. Despite the references to God and Purgatory that I use, I am not a Christan nor do I believe in the tenants of Judaism and do not see this song as religious in any way.
"On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair" *Guy driving either a convertible or a motorcycle.*
"Up ahead in the distance, I saw shimmering light" *The headlights of an oncoming vehicle.*
"My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim" *He falls asleep/passes out.*
"I had to stop for the night" *He dies.*
"There she stood in the doorway;" *The greeter.*
"I heard the mission bell" *His death knell*
"And I was thinking to myself,
'This could be Heaven or this could be Hell'" *No pearly gates nor burning fires because it's Purgatory, but since you're not told where you go when you die, Purgatory can be what you make of it.*
"Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way
There were voices down the corridor,
I thought I heard them say...
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place (Such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face
Plenty of room at the Hotel California
Any time of year (Any time of year)
You can find it here" *He is welcomed to Purgatory by the other residents.*
"Her mind is Tiffany-twisted, she got the Mercedes Benz
She got a lot of pretty, pretty boys she calls friends" *Here we learn what happened to the woman he left behind after he died. The singer and his woman were both famous and the "boys" are hangers on now that she is a widow.*
"How they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat.
Some dance to remember, some dance to forget" *What her and the handsome hangers on do (maybe sex). Some to remember him, some to forget.*
"So I called up the Captain,
'Please bring me my wine'
He said, 'We haven't had that spirit here since nineteen sixty nine'" *I always felt that he is unaware that he is dead at first, so he acts like a regular hotel guest. No one has been that feisty for along time.*
"And still those voices are calling from far away,
Wake you up in the middle of the night
Just to hear them say...
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place (Such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face
They livin' it up at the Hotel California" *Again the souls of the dead in Purgatory calling to him.*
"What a nice surprise (what a nice surprise)" *He starts to realize that he is dead.*
"Bring your alibis" *No one wants to be dead, so he must be anywhere else and have proof.*
"Mirrors on the ceiling,
The pink champagne on ice" The banquet hall.
"And she said 'We are all just prisoners here, of our own device'" *Every soul here did something in life that put them into Purgatory. Something they did or how they were that denies them either eternal reward or eternal punishment.*
"And in the master's chambers,
They gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives,
But they just can't kill the beast" *We all know that 'steely' is a nod to Steely Dan. I have always pictured this scene as God giving them a chance to earn their way out of Purgatory, but they never can. Also it always felt like the eternal frustration of sameness that must be what Purgatory is like.*
"Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before" *He tries to go back to life, to living. 'Last thing I remember' because when he opens the door and tries to leave he passes out and wakes up back in his hotel room.*
"'Relax,' said the night man,
'We are programmed to receive." *The night man is the desk clerk. He is explaining that Purgatory and death is a one-way door. *
"You can check-out any time you like,
But you can never leave!'" *The night man is saying that you can pretend to be alive all you like, but it doesn't change a thing.*
shimmering light in the beginning is the lady ghost tennant of the hotel alluring him.
whatever happend at the hotel pbviously happend at 1969 seeing as they had no wine sence then.
common superstition states that the spirit realm is closest to the realm of the living at the 12:00's and in the spring and fall solstices. the calitis flower blooms in the solstice and he hears voices in the middle of the night. anyone will tell you ghosts sound as if they come from far away.
bring your alibis... referring to perhaps a red light districts sort of hotel.
prisoners of their own device... whwne you die people say when you go to hell you have dinner with the devil (or beast pick one of the many names for the devil) stabbing the devil to try and stay alive because of course human nature is denial.
Joe, Vicksburg,MS
Joe, Vicksburg, MS
I know most of you think im stupid but when you listen to it backward you can hear ("satan he hears this,he had me believe").And who think that 1969 is a coincidence? 1969... 969... 666.
that's all i have to say for the moment.
"On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair
Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air" ~ the protagonist was walking, seemingly dosed with drugs(colitas).
"Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light
"My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim
I had to stop for the night" ~ he saw the church light, and since the side effects of the drug was kicking in, he had no choice but to stayover.
"There she stood in the doorway
I heard the mission bell
And I was thinking to myself,
This could be Heaven or this could be Hell" ~ A woman welcomed his visit. However, despite being a church(heaven), it was a satanic one(hell) and thus he had his reservations.
"Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way
There were voices down the corridor,
I thought I heard them say... "~ he was ushered into the church and there seemed to be a ritual going on with all the voices around.
"chorus"~ he was welcomed by cultists.
"Her mind is Tiffany-twisted, she got the Mercedes bends"~ he saw a rich girl who was shapely.
" She got a lot of pretty, pretty boys, that she calls friends
How they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat.
Some dance to remember, some dance to forget"~ Subtlely, it hints of the fact that an orgy is taking place.
" So I called up the Captain,
Please bring me my wine
He said, "We haven't had that spirit here since nineteen sixty nine"~ 1969 was the year the first satanic church was set up, and the spirit here literally meant ghosts.
" And still those voices are calling from far away,
Wake you up in the middle of the night
Just to hear them say... + chorus"~ the ritual continued.
"Mirrors on the ceiling,
The pink champagne on ice
And she said "We are all just prisoners here, of our own device"~ basic description of the interior. More emphasis is on the latter part when the woman said that people chose to practise this(satanic cult) on their own accord.
"And in the master's chambers,
They gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives,
But they just can't kill the beast "~ it isnt a real feast we are talking about; it is a human sacrifice! They were using razor sharp knives to stab the sacrificial, yet they could never get rid of the demons that were residing in their hearts.
"Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before "~ the protagonist got scared and he had to leave the place.
"Relax," said the night man,
We are programmed to receive.
You can checkout any time you like,
but you can never leave"~ he saw a guy who let him leave. The guy commented that anyone was welcomed to the cult but once you joined the cult, there would be no turning back.
"the song is about the eternal Abyss known as Hell on Earth...anyone venturing into this Eternal Abyss, will rise from the ashes of satan, to roam the earth in search of truth and justice and The American way
It was not true.
You can figure out why on your own.
Hotel California...was the name of the Eagles Tour Bus... that's all... the song is about the band... Wow.. some of your comments are scary... do a little research.
However, I previously interpreted the song to be about some sort of brothel."this could be heaven and this could be hell" (depends how you rate sex with strangers?) "mirrors on the ceiling, pink champagne on ice" "she's got a lot of pretty pretty boys, she calls friends" (just suspect!) "how they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat.some dance to remember, some dance to forget" (dance=sex?) "we are all just prisoners here, of our own devise" (prostitutes?)
It makes sense to me?!
Interesting thread, and a classic example of how individual interpretation can soon digress into conjuring fairy tales. Most people here seem to be overlooking the fact that the best explanation has already been given from the men who penned it. The song is [i]littered[/i] with metaphors and deliberately so. How boring would a song be if every line were literal in it's meaning? Paradoxically, what makes this song so interesting, is that listeners tend to do exactly that, and then are left with trying to make sense of 'stabbing beasts with steely knives' - it's quite laughable.
Interestingly, long before they eventually reformed, Don Henley was asked when the Eagles would ever get back together and he replied '...when hell freezes over...', hence the name of the comeback tour. Perhaps the same people who believe Hotel California is about devil worship, will also think there are evil doers in their droves skating around satan's abyss.
it seems so good to people who are desparate and you can check out (a different phrase for die)any time you like but you can never leave (you cant come back from the dead)"my legs got heavy and my sight grew dim i had to stop for the night" (could be a refrence to the sensation of dying or the fact he got so tired of everything he wanted to "go to sleep" yet another word for dying.
Monica
To the extext the song may have originally been about LA commercial decadence, it is even moreso today. 70 km south is Cabo San Lucas, as disgusting a glitzy west coast tourist trap as can be found in the States, with Hard Rock Cafe karyoke, drunken hedonism on sunset cruises, stores that sell Chinese-made t-shirts promoting Budweiser and titty contests, and a time-share vendor at every street corner. Prices have tripled in 3 years: a hot dog sells for $15 at a nearby resort! "Prisoners of our own device" indeed! Walking the streets, the only clue that you're in Mexico is the Spanish spoken by the locals and on the street signs. Tourist agencies actually call it the "Los Angelization" of Los Cabos.
Todos Santos remains beautiful and inspiring. I hope the Eagles, their promoters, and their average fans (excluding members of this webpage) will stay away, or visit it with subdued reverence and respect.
Summary of the Allegory of the Cave:
People have been chained down in a dark cave for their whole lives. All they can see, all they have ever seen, are shadows of the rest of the world on the wall infront of them. Because they don't know any better, they assume that these shadows are real. One day, a prisoner is released from his chains. He goes outside of the cave, into the light, burning his eyes, but becoming enlightened. He decides to go back into the cave to tell everyone what he saw, but they don't believe him.
In the Allegory, the darkness of the cave represents ignorance, the light represents knowledge, and the chains represent our perception of the world.
How Hotel California connects to The Allegory of the Cave:
Lyrics: On a dark desert highway
Cool wind in my hair
Warm smell of colitas
Rising up through the air
Thoughts: Instead of a dark cave we have a "dark desert highway" that, to the prisoners, seems like a nice place.
Lyrics: Up ahead in the distance
I saw a shimmering light
My head grew heavy, and my sight grew dim
I had to stop for the night
Thoughts: The shimmering light alludes to the "light" or knowledge that the man who broke free of his chains gained. Like the man, the narrator of the song hurt his eyes because of it.
Lyrics: There she stood in the doorway
I heard the mission bell
And I was thinking to myself
This could be Heaven or this could be Hell
Thoughts: "She" could mean knowledge; because the narrator has been in the dark for so long, he is still uncertain if he believes that the knowledge he's learning is real.
Lyrics: Then she lit up a candle
And she showed me the way
There were voices down the corridor
I thought I heard them say
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place
Such a lovely place (background)
Such a lovely face
Plenty of room at the Hotel California
Any time of year
Any time of year (background)
You can find it here
You can find it here
Thoughts: The narrator is still learning. The other people who broke free of their chains tell him that the light is much better then ignorance in the dark and it was here all along. All he had to do was think.
Lyrics: Her mind is Tiffany twisted
She's got the Mercedes bends
She's got a lot of pretty, pretty boys
That she calls friends
Thoughts: Again, "her" means knowledge. The narrator is saying that she seems to have and know everything. Everyone else who broke their chains are trying to gain as much knowledge as they can("she's got a lot of pretty, pretty boys"). By calling the knowledgable people pretty, the narrator is starting to show that he believes that the knowledge he's gaining is real and the "shadows" are an illusion.
Lyric: How they dance in the courtyard
Sweet summer sweat
Some dance to remember
Some dance to forget
Thoughts: Some (remember, the "they" in the lyrics above refers to the people who have broken their chains.)dance to remember that the knowledge they gained in the light is not an illusion. Some dance to forget the shadows in the dark cave.
Lyric: So I called up the Captain
Please bring me my wine
He said
We haven't had that spirit here since 1969
Thoughts: By requesting wine, the narrator is showing that he wants to forget the knowledge he gained. The Captain is surprised by this. Most people who come into the light never want to go back except for a case in 1969.
Lyric: And still those voices are calling from far away
Wake you up in the middle of the night
Just to hear them say
Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely Place
Such a lovely Place (background)
Such a lovely face
They're livin' it up at the Hotel California
What a nice surprise
What a nice surprise (background)
Bring your alibies
Thoghts: The enlightened people still keep insisting that the light is better then the dark. Alibies will be needed for the individuals still in the dark; not everyone is ready to learn about the light.
Lyic: The Mirrors on the ceiling
Pink champagne on ice
And she said
We are all just prisoners here
Of our own device
Thoughts: No one can be forced to stay in either the darness or light; anything that keeps you in a place you don't want to be is due to your "own device."
Lyric: And in the master's chambers
They gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives
But they just can't kill the beast
Thoughts: Don't forget, this is still from the narrator's point of view. He sees what the enlightened people believe and the events they take part in, but it all sees so weird to him, a person who has known nothing but shadows for his whole life.
Lyric: Last thing I remember
I was running for the door
I had to find the passage back to the place I was before
Thoughts: Finally, he can't take it and wants to go back to his cave.
Lyric: Relax said the nightman
We are programed to recieve
You can check out any time you like
But you can never leave
Thoughts: The nightman tells him that he can go back to the cave, but it won't be the same; he'll never forget the knowledge he learned in the light of the Hotel California.
The real tregedy here is not the fact that once you have forsaken all to reach a life of oppulance and excess and found it to be a purgatory of sorts, but rather the fact that your innocence is forever lost "You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave."
Fortunately, what makes Hotel California, in my opinion, a national anthem is that it is merely a message, a warning, if you will, that all that glitters is not gold. We ultimately have the choice as to what path we will follow. We can learn from the mistakes of others and we can choose good over evil, love over material gain. We, as listeners can take confort that we are afforded a glimpse of a kind of Hell that is entirely avioidable. We still and always will have the choice to make and in that we are free and content.
The preceding lyric was contributed by Jackson Browne. It was in reference to his wife who had committed suicide.
and orchestral flavour.
Perhaps the pop song n:r 1 of all times.
It reminds me of the movie "Shine"
I often wondered about the "steely knives" bit. The rest I just figured was drug-induced lyrical writing.
Anyway, one of my favorite song from my childhood. Not much to add other than that. ;)
Another line that supports this theory is "We are all just prisoners here, of our own device," which refers to the feeling of being trapped in an addiction that you and only you trap yourself in. The "Some dance to remember, some dance to forget" line (in my opinion) contrasts the stages of addiction amung the characters of the song. Some do it to get high, some do it to survive.
I love metaphorical music, I'm not a drug addict I promise! It just seems that all of the music from this era can be inturpreted this way. Unlike today, musicians could not flat-out speak of their debauchery, so they used metaphors. It started with Muddy Waters, was copied by the Stones and Beatles, re-invented by Bob Dylan, and killed by the blunt rappers who can say anything and still get on the radio. Regardless of your inturpretation, great song with great poetry. This is my first post by the way, I love this site.
Thanks!
Read it here:
http://www.nyu.edu/classes/keefer/hell/sart.html
It has fit my mindset so many times during the trials and tribulations of life -better than any other song, ever. Reecently I told my kids (35, 21, 20, and 17) that when they spread my ashes at sea I want them to play hotel california and have everyone sing along. No eulogy-just this song!!
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."
by the way, what is it with people saying some lyrics are satanic? one mention of drugs, people are convinced it's about the devil. either you like the lyrics or you don't.
btw, if anyone's interested in the band's POV, buy Eagles the best of cd, it has a nifty booklet where the band descbribes the meaning behind the songs, it's great.
This puts the nail in the coffin:
http://www.snopes.com/music/songs/hotel.htm
And, as a side note, I just read this post: "I always thought that there was a legendary group of "devil-worshippers" or pagens, they called themself, the Hotel California. A strange interpertation, but I'm sure it has something to do with the devil. - Allan, Greebock, Scotland". Just wanted to say, pagans are NOT necessarily devil worshippers. In fact, depending on what branch of paganism you're referring to, many don't even believe in the devil.
...and now I'll shut up :o)
Taz, UK
According to Henley and Frey, the song was basically was about the dark side of the lifestyle inside of the California music industry. Hotel California is a metaphor for that lifestyle, which the Eagles discovered that once they were immersed in it, they were trapped.
the line, "you can check out but you can never leave" means to me that you can kill yourself, your physical body, but your spirit will always be in the game so to speak. We can't exit the game. Although I would like to at times.
Hotel California is a true classic; I can't be bothered writing every little bit of my interpretation as I can't come close to describing it's intricate detail, but basically to sum it up in a few words I think it says: 'You reap what you sew'..
'Life in the fast lane' - messed around and got lost / they didn't care they were just dying to get off
'New kid in town' where fame means nothing more than being the flavour of the minute.
'The last resort' about the hidden costs of all the pleasures and material goods.
it is not in my opinion that bands like the almighty Led Zeppelin and the Eagles intentionally put subliminal satan messages in their music on purpose, i just think they sound pretty friggin' cool
In all honesty, when you think about it, why would Hotel California be satanic?
"My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim"
HELLO?! Drugs people...drugs...it's not hard to figure out...just like Stairway to Heaven has o do with suicide. Hence the name. The Eagles used Hotel California as a setting that posed as a state of mind. Hotel California is the place that people go when they are becoming addicted to drugs. La La land, if you will...in the song it speaks of decision, the feeling of being trapped and trying to escape, all signs of drug addiction. "Some dance to remember, some dance to forget" dancing can be taken as feeling light and away. Forgetting is a common effect of drug use. "Last thing I remember, I was running for the door" obviously trying to escape the addiction. Marriage in California can happen anywhere, it is just stereotyped because of the population and celebrities. Anyone can have marriage problems. Divorce? Same thing. People, stop with the satanic comments! The Eagles are not satanic, and just because they sing about something doesn't mean they participate in it.
2. My two cents on "HC": I believe that one has to consider the entire album to derive the meaning of the song "HC". The song "HC" serves as an all-encompassing intro to what the rest of the album is about; the California lifestyle, the recording industry, drugs, sex, greed, religion, shamans as prophets, the environment and of course, love (what would an Eagles album be without a love song or two?) Track One, "Hotel California", sets you up for tracks Two through Nine...it's called exposition. Of course, this is not gospel, just my thoughts.
A strange interpertation, but I'm sure it has something to do with the devil.
Jackson Brown is a close friend of the Eagles, and his wife killed herself in the spring of 1976. It is believed that he met her around 1969- hence the line---------> "we haven't had that spirit here, since 1969".
Jackson Brown wrote many of the Eagles songs, and I believe that Hotel California is about his marriage to Phyllis Major.
The very lines in the song-------->
On a dark desert highway
Cool wind in my hair
Warm smell of colitas
Rising up through the air
Up ahead in the distance
I saw a shimmering light
My head grew heavy, and my sight grew dim
I had to stop for the night
Describes how he met his first wife Phyllis. The song then skips ahead a few months to when Phyllis & Jackson Browne are getting married, and he describes his uncertainity as he says "I heard the mission bell, and I was thinking to myself this could be heaven or this could be hell".
The chorus then skips to the present, with Jackson Browne remembering Phyllis.
It then jumps backwards, where he expresses how being married to Phyllis isnt how he imagined. "Her mind is Tiffany twisted
She's got the Mercedes bends
She's got a lot of pretty, pretty boys
That she calls friends
How they dance in the courtyard
Sweet summer sweat
Some dance to remember
Some dance to forget".
The next few lines in the song are crucial, he says "So I called up the Captain, please bring me my wine. He said we haven't had that spirit here since 1969". This reflects back to when he and Phyllis first met, and how it was everything he ever wanted, then it changed.
"And still those voices are calling from far away wake you up in the middle of the night just to hear them say..." These lyrics talk about Jackson dreaming of his wife Phyliss, and seeing her in his dreams, after she had passed.
"Mirrors on the ceiling
Pink champagne on ice
And she said
We are all just prisoners here
Of our own device" -------> These lyrics talk about suicide, and how we all are really just prisoners of our own device, and how some can break away from it and others can't.
The final lyrics in the song--------->
"And in the master's chambers
They gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives
But they just can't kill the beast
Last thing I remember
I was running for the door
I had to find the passage back to the place I was before
Relax said the nightman
We are programed to recieve
You can check out any time you like
But you can never leave"
Particularly the "You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave" lyric refers once again to suicide, and how even once you have committed suicide, you still haven't really escaped. You live on in the hearts of those you left behind, and even though suicide seemed like the only escape, you still didn't leave.
The whole theme of the suicide/marriage of Jackson Browne to Phyllis Major really fits. Just read the lyrics and you will understand how it fits.
"On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair
Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air "
Just descirbing setting
"Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light " When he was driving and doing some drugs he saw a place up ahead
"My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim
I had to stop for the night "
After all the drugs he had to stop and sleep
"There she stood in the doorway
I heard the mission bell
And I was thinking to myself,
This could be Heaven or this could be Hell"
I don't know what this has to do witha haunted hotel
"Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way "
Person showing him his room
"There were voices down the corridor,
I thought I heard them say...
Welcome to the Hotel California "
Ghosts in the haunted hotel talking to him.
I am not very good with lyrics. This is just what I quickly thought. This song was sung before I was born and I think it is brilliant.
At first it is difficult to understand what that society is. You feel free and easy there. But soon you realize the society is cruel, phony and even malicious and hostile, because it never lets go of you. You must submit your soul and will to strange and cruel rituals and laws.
The song's hero understands that this 'lovely place' is just a screen in order to entice people to the trap.
The song doesn't give us a response what happens with the main hero in the future. But I think he'll manage to leave that sweet deceptive 'Hotel California'.
i have no idea when they decided that these people have "talent" it saddens me and non of eagles songs could be "over" played but htey can be played alot
just my opinion
well theory actually
hehe :)
California, Pink Champagne, Mercedes -- symbols of wealth and status.
As I see it, this song really is about materialism. But seriously...does it really matter what the song's about? It's awesome...my favourite song of all time, and I love it no matter what we decide it means.
this was the producer cutting the tape and adding a blank part in.
No, he stopped because he was tired. Sometimes people don't realize how tired they are until they spot an opportunity to rest. And then "his head grew heavy and his sight grew dim..."
This song has been analyzed to such an extreme that it is made out to be more than it really is. I agree that Hotel California was created in tribute to Steely Dan, but there is little more
to it in terms of content. Pleasant, floating lyrics throughout, reminiscent of the mysterious smell of colitas "rising up through the air" which set the tone at the beginning. Scents incite powerful associations in our minds, and in this case it was evidently associated with some expectation drawing us onward until we find the mysterious "presence" lurking behind the association. At this point, he was satisfied to rest at last.
Probably the overall "air" of mysteriousness to the song was designed to purposely incite comments, and in that sense the song was definitely a masterpiece. Rock fans have been puzzling over lyrics since the beginning of the genre, and rock artists sometimes take advantage of this fact. "The Walrus was Paul." The Beatles were a prime example of a rock band that loved to insert mysterious lines into their lyrics: "Everybody's got one" -- or was it "everybody smoke pot"? The first mysterious Rock lyric references were to sex, not drugs. "Good golly, Miss Molly, you sure like to ball!" But not every reference has to be to sex or drugs. Sometimes,
as in the case of Hotel California, it has a more innocent and poetic meaning. The Eagles were artists, not sex and drug peddlers. Sometimes, a cigar is just a cigar, and in this case a colita is just a flower (as Chris from Milford said).
And I was thinking to myself, 'this could be heaven or this could be hell'" This is talking about how the drug (personified as a woman) is calling to him. Hearing the mission bell symbolizes being called...like to church. In this case, the drug is calling to him. He was thinking that it might be heaven or hell. Obviously, he may feel good from taking the drug or it may have negative effects on him. "Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way" This is the act of the man lighting up. "There were voices down the corridor, I thought I heard them say...Welcome to the hotel california, Such a lovely place. Such a lovely face." This is referring to the beginning of his addiction. He is beginning to become addicted to it. It looks good from the outside. Everyone seems happy and the initial feeling is good. "Plenty of room at the hotel california. Any time of year, you can find it here" There is room for anybody in addiction. ANYBODY can begin an addiction such as this. Since it IS an addiction, it will be there forever. "Her mind is tiffany-twisted, she got the mercedes bends" The Mercedes Bends are the effects of Cocaine as told by Andy a while ago. "She got a lot of pretty, pretty boys, that she calls friends" The she is still referring to cocaine and a lot of good looking people us it. "Some dance to remember, some dance to forget" Some of them are using the drug to remember "the good old days" while others are using it to forget about their pain. "And still those voices are calling from far away, Wake you up in the middle of the night Just to hear them say...[into chorus]" Alright, the man often wakes up in the middle of the night hearing "voices" which are really cravings for cocaine. Which then leads into the chorus which is about the addiction welcoming him. "What a nice surprise, bring your alibis" Everyone has their own excuse for using it. "Mirrors on the ceiling, The pink champagne on ice...They gathered for the feast They stab it with their steely knives..." Alright, pink champagne first of all is a slang term for cocaine. Mirrors on the celing...the mirrors are reflection the celing. Therefore, this is talking about when they place the cocaine on little mirrors and cut through it with those little knives. To continue, they are gathered for the feast, they are about to smoke cocaine! "But they just can't kill the beast" The "beast" is the addiction! They can't kill it even though they are stabbing the drug. To go back to "And she said 'we are all just prisoners here, of our own device'" They are prisoners or trapped by this addiction by their own doing. The each got themselves into this situation. "Last thing I remember, I was running for the door. I had to find the passage back to the place I was before." The man is trying to break from this addiction. He is trying to RUN away from it and find the place he was before meaning before he took the drug. Lastly, "You can checkout any time you like,but you can never leave!" This is talking about how although they may "checkout" or get out of the "hotel" or state of addiction, they are never going to be able to leave it or fully get rid of it. They will continue to come back for more. Let me know what you think.
still a great song.
a afvorite of mine since 1984.
The warm smell of colitas is marijuana, silly ones! That is the biggest drug reference in the whole song.
And DON HENLEY sings on HC.
What a great song. What a great band.
I also wanted to mention that I find the comment referencing the song to marriage to be extremely logical and well thought out, and all the lyrics fit perfectly with this metaphor, as described by Joseph from Atlanta (scroll to the very bottom of the screen to find this comment).
i'm telling you guys, but don't tell anyone.
this song is probably about 2 guys in pajamas, playing with eachother's hair.
It's means nothing.. it's like an episode of the Twilight Zone they were using joke sculptures.
Here is a quote from Glen Frey on this website:
http://www.eaglesmusic.com/HotelCal/hc.html
I quote: "What happened with Hotel California was Don Felder, the under rated genius guitar player in our band and he did not have the name of Joe Walsh, but definitely just an incredible player.
He used to make instrumental demos at his house and on a tape of about seven ideas, was what was to become the track of Hotel California.
And Don and I heard the tape and said gosh... this is like a Spanish Reggae Rock, this is really a bizarre mix of musical influences, this is great.
At the time we were also quite fond of Steely Dan and listening to a lot of their records. And one of the things that impressed us about Steely Dan was that they would say anything in their songs and it did not have to necessarily make sense you know, they would just, sort of...they called it jokes sculpture..
And well we thought of this Hotel California, we started thinking of there would be very cinematic to do it, sort of like the Twilight Zone. You just have a ..., one line says there is a guy on the highway, you know the next line says there is a hotel in the distance, then there is a woman in there and she walks in. You know it is sort..., it is just all one shot, not necessarily you know, just sort of strong together and you sort of draw your own conclusions from it.
So we are sort of trying to expand our lyrical horizons and just try to take out something in the bizarre as Steely Dan did that."
GRAMMY Category Record Of The Year
Year 1977 - 20th Annual GRAMMY Awards
Title of the Work Hotel California
Artist Performing Work Eagles
Ed McMann
Anyway, Hotel California always reminds me of Last Year At Marienbad. There is one crucial difference, though: Marienbad sucks.
Actually its the best song ever written.
im 14 and somehow it makes me escape from my life.
The song doesnt make any sense but thats what makes it a great song, people listen to it because they are trying to figure it out what it is about.
A side comment: I live in Atlanta..why do I never meet men as erudite as Joseph? I think he has an excellent point.
Or is this song simply a statement telling us that we are not in control of our own lives, that we slave day and night for our apparent "masters", who would have us believe that we DO have a choice?
Listen to the words, not too carefully though. Don't try to think about them, that's what you were meant to do, that's how they hid the true meaning.
In a world ran by hidden powers and secret societies, how can we be sure of what is or isn't free speech or even free thought?
In a world where "freedom of speech" and "freedom of ideals" gets you incarcerated or even worse, you seem to "disappear", how can a song so meaningful be explained so easily. The only people who truely know the "real" meaning behind the song are the writers. They don't want us to know the true meaning, not out of spite, but out of fear! Fear of compromising the "powers" and all that they try to accomplish.
Listen to the song again, then ask yourself. "Am I living my own life. Do I exist, or am I being allowed to exist?"
Contemplate these words. Do not simply dismiss them as you have been "programmed" to.
Ponder not on the meaning of the song, just the meaning of the "power words" used in the song...
We ARE programmed to receive... You can check out anytime you want, but you can NEVER leave.
"And in the master's chambers
They gathered for the feast..." Any conspiracy theorist out there will know the TRUE meaning behind this... The "enlightened" ones!
Do what thou willst, shall be the whole of the law!
The song starts out with a married rock musician feeling horny. He goes to a club (brothel, whatever) and finds a woman. He knows he['s taking a risk, but is incapable of resisting (this could be heaven or this could be hell). When he hears the mission bell, it's a wake up call that he has screwed up royally.
The phrase "in the master's chambers... just can't kill the beast" could refer to talking to his agent/manager about the competition he was feeling from Steely Dan and the pressure it was putting on him.
At the end, the tablooids got to him. He would love to get back to where he was before the drugs and the women ruined his life, but the notoriety about his exploits is now public knowledge.
Just a thought.
Suzanne R., Dallas
you can see it in the line "relax said the nightman , we are programed to recieve. you can check out any time you like ,but you can never leave."
Don: Actually, I was a little disappointed with how the record was taken, because I meant it in a much broader sense than a commentary about California. I was looking at American culture, and when I called that one song "Hotel California, I was simply using California as a microcosm for the rest of America and for the self-indulgence of our entire culture.
It was, to a certain extent, about California, about the excesses out here. But in many instances, as California goes, so goes the nation. Things simply happen out here or in New York first whether it's with drugs or fashion or artistic movements or economic trends and then work their way toward the middle of America. And thats what I was trying to get at.
and here's what both DON and GLENN had to say about the song:
Glenn: 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 definitely thinking and writing outside the box. We had never written any song like it before. 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 sideâ??the Eagles take a look at the seamy underbelly of L.A.â??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 "knives," which is still, you know, a penile metaphor. Stabbing, thrusting, etc.
Almost everybody in my business 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 individual 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 Zoneâ??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-esqueâ??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.
Don: We were enamored with hotels. Hotels were a big part of our lives. The Beverly Hills Hotel had become something of a focal pointâ??literally and symbolically. I?ve always been interested in architecture and the language of architecture, and, at that time, I was particularly keen on the mission style of early California. I thought there was a certain mystery and romance about it. Then, there are all the great movies and plays in which hotels figure prominently, not only as a structure, but as a dramatic device. Films such as Grand Hotel, The Night Porter, and even Psychoâ??motels count too. There are plays like Neil Simon?s Plaza Suite and California Suite, which Glenn and I went to see while writing the song. We saw it as homework or research. We were looking for things that would stimulate us and give us ideas. Sometimes it was just driving around. We would still take trips out to the desert. At one point, Glenn and I rented a little red house up in Idlewildâ??way up in the San Bernardino Mountains. We?d drive out there sometimes just to clear our heads, sleep on the floor in sleeping bags. We didn?t have any furniture. We were just on the quest.
I thought I heard them say...and the chorus" are other patients talking. They are being sarcastic. The whole next verse refers to those who aren't too sick, some are still hopeful and some are about to give up hope ("How they dance in the courtyard Sweet summer sweat Some dance to remember Some dance to forget"). The chorus, again, is the call of patients being sarcastic. One particular part is "What a nice surprise", talking about the surprise of having cancer. "Mirrors on the ceiling" refers to the hosptial. Hospital ER always seem metalic and shiny. "And she said We are all just prisoners here Of our own device" is completely true. Cancer is created by are own disfunctional cells. "And in the master's chambers
They gathered for the feast They stab it with their steely knives But they just can't kill the beast" is talking about the actual surgery. The docters gather for the operation, but no matter what they do, they can't get rid of the cancer. "Last thing I remember I was running for the door I had to find the passage back to the place I was before Relax said the nightman We are programed to recieve You can check out any time you like But you can never leave" is the final realization that he has cancer. He wants to get back to the time before he had it, but he can't. He can never leave....Well, I hope you enjoyed that! THANKS FOR YOUR TIME!!!
"Plenty of room at the Hotel California" I wonder why..
"Commander Tiffany twisted...."
"Some dance to remember, some dance to forget!"
"Mirrors on the ceiling, the pink champagne on ice. And she said, we are all just prisoners here, of our own device."
And finally, but not least...
"You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave!"
I have a lot of ppl backing me up on this one... It's weird how a song is able to keep so many ways open, so many options that is possible... I agree with it being a shame they don't make songs like this anymore...
the song's about and around drugs, not neccesarily anti or pro...
The first part - until the first chorus - is the guy dead and "choosing" whether he should go to hell or to heaven. The "desert highway" would be the after-life highway to heaven, the "mission bell" would be the door to heaven, but somehow his attention is drawn to a different place - Hotel California. Devil is pulling his game.
The second part is after his choice for hell, when everything is just fine. Fancy good-looking ladies, dance and pretty boys as friends.
The voices down the corridor would be the guy's own conscience, remembering of the bad choice he has made (I believe the praise of the Hotel in the chorus is a little bit sarcastic).
In the third and last part is when the true face of hell is shown, the seduction is over and now the Devil (the nightman) is going to collect its debts. The fancy girl turns out to be a "prisoner" (not physically, but her soul is doomed).
The master's chambers (Lucifer himself) is another reference to hell.
The steely knive stabbing I can interpret two ways: one could be a ritual of black magic and the other would be the rage of the main character after he realized he was deceived by the Devil. He could stab the Devil as long as he wanted to, but it would never die.
And the final verse is the guy trying to escape, maybe back to the desert highway, but the Devil closes the Devil and states that great last sentence, meaning that the guy was doomed for the whole eternity.
I would like to take key lyrics out and relate them as how I see they fit with the theme:
"On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair", I believe this refers to a dark time in life, one that you are trying to escape. Alone, in the endless darkness.
"Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air
Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light ", I see this as a possible escape from the darkness. You find a way out, and it seems pleasing to begin with.
" I had to stop for the night There she stood in the doorway I heard the mission bell And I was thinking to myself, This could be Heaven or this could be Hell ", He stops for the night because there is a chance that he can get out of it. And he sees the temptation (Women always represent temptation.) He thinks to himself, as he gets his first taste, "This could be Heaven of Hell" in regards to the mixed feelings that he is having.
" Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way There were voices down the corridor, " This "temptation" draws him in the Hotel, which represents addiction. The voices of the other addicts welcome him to this beautiful prision.
The Chorous, "Welcome to the Hotel California Such a lovely place Such a lovely face Plenty of room at the Hotel California Any time of year, you can find it here " Says a lot. This says now, for the first time he is trapped. It chorus is put here because he has just been drawn in and now, even if he does not realize it, he will not be comming back out. It is such a lovely place with so much beauty, because everything is more beautiful in the 'Hotel' as long as you play along. It also says that it does not matter when you want it, because you know you can always have it. California is always beautiful... as long as you see it that way.
"Her mind is Tiffany-twisted, she got the Mercedes bends She got a lot of pretty, pretty boys, that she calls friends ", this is really a genuis line. He says that she is a very twisted, but very beautful girl. This is the first time he speaks of anything negative about the 'Hotel'. This could be the end of a high. He also comments that she has many pretty boys, saying that temptation has captured so many other people as well.
"How they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat. Some dance to remember, some dance to forget " The important part is the second line. Some do this dance to feel how they used to, to feel good again, and some do the 'dance' to forget the pain, to make their problems go away.
"So I called up the Captain, Please bring me my wine He said, "We haven't had that spirit here since nineteen sixty nine" ", He tries to get something else, but nothing works. (I still have not cracked this line just yet, but I believe that is close.)
"And still those voices are calling from far away, Wake you up in the middle of the night
Just to hear them say... " Even though he talks to them, even though he is in the Hotel now, he can still hear them calling for him, deeper and deeper within the 'Hotel' He wakes up, probably in cold sweats... remembering what a lovely place it is... what a great feeling it was, and it calls to him.
"And she said "We are all just prisoners here, of our own device"", no matter who they are, they are all here because they did it to themselves. They are trapped in the Hotel because they made this decision.
"The stab it with their steely knives, But they just can't kill the beast ", This seems to refer to feeding the addiction. (Steely knives - needles) That ever addict wants to quit... after this one. and they think if they do it this last time, then that will be it.
"Last thing I remember, I was Running for the door I had to find the passage back To the place I was before ", He is trying to find his way back, now he realizes what he has gotten himself into. He is trying to go back through time, take back his mistake.
" "Relax," said the night man, We are programmed to receive.", I believe this one, loosely translated means "Why worry, you are here anyway, just enjoy it."
"You can checkout any time you like, but you can never leave!". You can say you are going to stop at any time, but you are never going to escape it. Once you are in the Hotel, there is no way out.
I hope someone is able to get something from this.
Thanks for your time.
One other meaning ive heard that sounds pretty plausible is that its about the record industry in California (Los Angeles to be more speficic). Its quite plausible considering how they start out the song about the colitas in the air (well, they were all snorkling up dope in their noses at the time being it seems) and how they say the "shimmering light". There is an attractive dispair in the opening verse: "And i was thinking to myself, this could be heaven or this could be hell". The chorus explains the tempting emotions you feel when coming in contact with such a place.
The second verse i cant really put my head on. Maybe it states that the song itself is about a girl coming there wanting to build a career. How she is seduced by the atmosphere and sudden success.
The rest of the song has alot of additions that states similar things. "So i called up the captain, please bring me my wine" - Implies that the character really has set his mind to success. "We havent had that spirit here, since 1969" - As someone stated, there hasnt been any artist with the devotion they had at woodstock since then. Some more fuzzy parts: "and in the masters chambers, they gathered for the feast" - Well, the record company is arranging parties for them - "They stab it with their steely knives, but they just cant kill the beast" - They try to get away from it, but their contracts are too strong for them to leave. This last past reflects in the last verse when he is running for the door.
This is just one, quite plausible, meaning of the song and i know there is more out there. Ive also heard people comparing it to joining a cult, perhaps satanic and im sure you can apply the text to even more things.
Just my two cents.
After listening to the song for the hundredth time, over the years, I finally decided what all of the words meant to one of the Eagles' most famous, and least understood songs. It seems to me, that the lyrics are a commentary on the state of Marriage, in California. Where so many relationships seem to go well at first, and then fall apart badly. Of course, few people at that time would knock such a strong social institution as Marriage- at least not directly. It was supposed to be the best that a relationship could be, and what we might all aspire to, one day yet so many of them had been going obviously wrong.
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Read the lyrics with me, below, and see if you find the same meaning or at least a few things to think about along the way. After all, the seventies were an age of veiled lyrical meanings, and creativity.
--------(Lyric:)--------
On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair. Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air
-------(Thoughts:)------
Some native Spanish speakers mentioned that colitas is the diminutive feminine plural of the Spanish cola, tail. Little tail. Looking for a little . . . Hmmm: perhaps colitas referred to a certain feature of the female anatomy. However there?s a dual meaning here, since colitis can also pertain to the little buds of marijuana, with a warm sweet smell. ( both somewhat intoxicating, and affecting judgment )At any rate our singer starts out a single man- riding carefree down the highway, thinking of his girl, who may even have been riding in the seat beside him.
--------(Lyric:)--------
Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering lightMy head grew heavy and my sight grew dimI had to stop for the night
-------(Thoughts:)------
This could be the only actual reference to a Hotel, but is again a dual meaning: With the influence of too much Mary-Jane, or too much girlfriend, our author stops (perhaps at a hotel) for the night. BUT more importantly, his sight/reasoning grows dim, because he decides to ?settle? for a girl that wasn?t quite right for him and thereby enters the "Hotel California", of relationships.
--------(Lyric:)--------
There she stood in the doorway;I heard the mission bellAnd I was thinking to myself,'This could be Heaven or this could be Hell'
-------(Thoughts:)------
What the song doesn?t directly say is: It is the doorway to a CHURCH. We've advanced a few months, and are about to be married, which is why you hear the mission bell. And as he looks at his bride, somewhat uncertain, he was thinking that this (the marriage) could be heaven, or could be hell
--------(Lyric:)--------
Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the wayThere were voices down the corridor,I thought I heard them say...Welcome to the Hotel CaliforniaSuch a lovely placeSuch a lovely facePlenty of room at the Hotel CaliforniaAny time of year, you can find it here
-------(Thoughts:)------
Candles and romance, for at least a honeymoon's worth, yet something is not quite right - a little voice in the distance bothers him: is this really going to work?He tries to convince himself he?s done the right thing. Welcome to the married life it's supposed to be good, right? Of course it is: look at her, she's lovely.Plenty of room at the hotel California more people getting married all the time, and inviting everybody else to do the same - just like you did. Any time of year you can find a time & place to get married. Yet the voices in his head are still there.
--------(Lyric:)--------
Her mind is Tiffany-twisted, she got the Mercedes bendsShe got a lot of pretty, pretty boys, that she calls friendsHow they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat.Some dance to remember, some dance to forget
-------(Thoughts:)------
It turns out, that his wife is definitely high maintainance, with expensive tastes and more interested in his money than him. After the initial passion is over, she's got several other boy-toys on the side. When he's out with his wife, he starts noticing other couples and depending on whether things are going well or not some dance to remember happy days, some dance to forget troubled ones.
--------(Lyric:)--------
So I called up the Captain,'Please bring me my wine' He said:'We haven't had that spirit here since nineteen sixty nine'And still those voices are calling from far away,Wake you up in the middle of the nightJust to hear them say...
-------(Thoughts:)------
The "spirit" here isn't alcohol, but the spirit & emotion of the marriage he?s looking for. Unfortunately that?s long gone, and we haven?t seen it for a while.Yet the voices are still there and the doubts grow stronger, leaving him awake in the middle of the night, thinking.
--------(Lyric:)--------
Welcome to the Hotel CaliforniaSuch a lovely placeSuch a lovely faceThey livin' it up at the Hotel CaliforniaWhat a nice surprise, bring your alibis
-------(Thoughts:)------
More voices,Other people think the marriage is going great - they're living it up- But it's not quite what you'd hoped (what a nice surprise)Excuses are made, accusations too, alibis are in order.
--------(Lyric:)--------
Mirrors on the ceiling,The pink champagne on iceAnd she said 'We are all just prisoners here, of our own device'
-------(Thoughts:)------
They try to rekindle the romance - get a little kinky - pour a few more drinks. We are all just prisoners here, of our own device: We're the ones who decided to get married - we did it to ourselves, but now we just feel trapped.
--------(Lyric:)--------
And in the master's chambers,They gathered for the feastThey stab it with their steely knives,But they just can't kill the beast
-------(Thoughts:)------
Sooner or later (in California style) the marriage is over.In the master's chambers (Judges chambers, during the divorce)They gather for the feast. The lawyers, and his wife are all going to benefit, an a gruesome, ugly, "feast" where they all take whatever they can get from the husbad.As for the Marriage: the bitter words, sharp tounges lash, but they can?t quite destroy the lingering shreds of marriage, or the husband portrayed as a "beast".... Yes, this can ALSO be a tribute to Steely Dan, as noted elsewhere- but that simply makes it all that more creative, to have double meanings, which are both valid.
--------(Lyric:)--------
Last thing I remember, I wasRunning for the doorI had to find the passage backTo the place I was before
-------(Thoughts:)------
By the time the divorce was finished, he just wanted OUT. With the marriage fully over, he tries to put his life back to how it had been, before he was ever married. but it's not easy
--------(Lyric:)--------
'Relax,' said the mad man,We are programmed to receive.You can checkout any time you like,but you can never leave!
-------(Thoughts:)------
That voice in his head reminds him, that it's never really over once you've been married, there's always going to be some part of you that isn't the same. For better or for worse, he realizes that even after getting divorced, and checking out of the "Hotel California," you can't just leave it all behind. We (society, biology or emotion) are programmed to receive. It's easier to get IN to marriage than out
--------(Conclusion)--------
I've considered this to be a highly crafted masterpiece of lyrics, by the Eagles, and suspect it will still be floating across the radio waves another 30 years from now. And while it speaks of relationships that went down in flames, I still think it leaves a hopefull message for others -- as if to say "take heed, what has befallen us" and "may your loves & lives find a happier way" -- so I've danced to the song frequently, and hope some day to be amoung those who "Dance to remember, not forget."
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