Rumoured to be about heroin addiction, cannibalism or devil worship Or at least, that's the most popular interpretation. Lifestyle the musicians enjoyed in the 1970s. The dark side - but it is really an allegory about the hedonistic It is ostensibly about a luxury hotel visit that crosses over to Glenn Frey: How Hotel California destroyed The Eagles “It’sĪbout the dark underbelly of the American dream. Not really about California it’s about America,” Henley said.
“Well, I always say, it’s a journey from innocence to experience. What does "Hotel California" really mean? (And other questions for Don Henley) edit- 21st March 2020, adding some of the quotes I refer to above Also the fact that you can turn almost anything in the song (colitas etc) into a reference to something else, that's also part of the nightmare feeling, that nothing is what it seems.
#EAGLES HOTEL CALIFORNIA MEANING FULL#
Also the nightmare feeling of an innocent person, who's arrived in this weird hotel full of decadence and odd goings-on, from which there seems no escape. The public statements by various band members about the song refer to the song being about the loss of innocence, and you can pretty much hang everything on that peg : personally for The Eagles themselves coming to California, knowing first-hand the excesses of the rock'n'roll life and other weirdness - more generally, a comment on American society turning away from a more hopeful, idealistic time into a time of self-centeredness and excess. Like a lot of great songs, which stick in people's heads, it was written to suggest a lot of things, rather than have a specific meaning.