SPORTS LEGEND: The Dallas Stars continue to pay Gary Glitter for the rights to play his song “Rock and Roll, Part 2” after Dallas goals, even after his arrest for sexual abuse and possession of child pornography.

Gary Glitter had a string of popular hits in the early 1970s.

The British Glam Rocker had one song, in particular, that practically took on a life of its own.

“Rock and Roll, Part 2” (you can watch a performance by Glitter of the song below) is the second part of a song Glitter wrote about the history of Rock and Roll. Part 1 has lyrics about the genre, while Part 2 is mostly instrumental except for some chanting and the word hey punctuating the song every once in awhile, as in “”Dah dah dah dah dah dah, HEY!”

The song was picked up by sports teams in the late 70s and quickly became a massive success played at sporting events, as it is a great song for crowds to cheer along with.

In 1999, Glitter hit the news in a bad way when he was arrested and sentenced to four months in prison (and was registered as a sex offender) for downloading tons of child pornography.

That apparently wasn’t a big deal to the world of sports, as nothing changed with his songs.

However, in 2005, he was arrested in Vietnam and sentenced to three years in jail for child sexual abuse.

THEN the sports leagues began to pay attention, and the NFL requested that all of its teams cease using Glitter’s songs during games (in some instances, they allowed a cover version of the song by another band be used).

The Dallas Stars, however (along with a few other teams) continued to use the song when a Stars player scored a goal.

Fans, naturally, were irritated (well, some of them, at least).

However, the Stars revealed an interesting facet of the situation…

American Airlines Center pays a usage fee for thousands of songs that are in a single music catalog (they are used for every event in the building – Mavs, Stars, etc.). Whether the Stars play Rock n Roll Part 2 or not does not increase or decrease the amount of royalties that Mr. Glitter would receive from this catalog. Therefore, he receives no extra benefit from the Dallas Stars playing the song after a goal. In fact, he sold the rights to his songs years ago and receives no royalties whatsoever. Nor are we trying to pay homage to him or honor him in any way.

We actually tried to change the official goal song played at Stars games a few seasons ago, and our fans demanded (in a very large number I might add) that Rock n Roll Part 2 be brought back as the goal song. We do not view it as a way of supporting Mr. Glitter, nor do we have any affiliation with him. It has simply become a sports rock anthem that is played in hundreds of arenas and sporting events around the world.

Whether Glitter still receives the rights to the use of his song or not (I have not seen any evidence that he does NOT, but perhaps I missed it), I find the Stars’ argument convincing that they do not actively pay Glitter for the rights to the song.

So, for the general implication behind the Stars playing the song, I’d say…

STATUS: False

but do they play the song? Yeah, so I guess it is also…

STATUS: At least Partially True.

Eventually, the Stars (and all other NHL teams) stopped using the song all together, though.

Thanks to fritz5134 for the YouTube clip!