Hall & Oates Appreciation Day: “She’s Gone”

To celebrate Hall & Oates’ election to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Philly Mag writers are sharing their memories and thoughts about the Philly duo.



I turned 18 in 1991, right before Nevermind was released and let me know that, as an adult, the value of music couldn’t be reduced to anything so petty as its ability to produce pleasure in the listener. Not coincidentally, this is about when Hall & Oates, who had dominated so much of the previous decade, seemed to get stashed in a drawer of Embarrassing ’80s things we thought maybe we’d like to forget.

We couldn’t forget. These guys were blue-eyed soulmeisters, sure, but more than that, they were entertainers. Watch the video above. It’s from before they found their (ahem) charisma as video arteests, yet they’re compellingly watchable in this. Darryl Hall is the most beautiful blonde of 1976. John Oates … is dressed like a professional wrestler-slash-magician? They’re literally paying the devil to replace her? Awesome. Turns out they were ahead of the literal video movement by 30 years. And, oh yeah, the song is endlessly singable. Hall & Oates never really went away. They just had to wait awhile for us to get over ourselves.