Life’s been good to Joe Walsh. Up until now, at any rate. Because he’s decided to take action against… Joe Walsh. Seriously, the wacky Eagles guitarist is involved in a legal wrangle with a Republican congressional candidate in the state of Illinois. And they share the same name.

Apparently, the politician is using the musician’s song Walk Away to promote his campaign, but has added his own lyrics. Naughty, naughty. The Eagles man has responded in a slightly eccentric manner by sending the would-be congressman a legal letter, explaining to him copyright laws:

“It (copyright) says a lot of things, but one of the things it says is that you can’t use someone else’s song for your political campaign promotion unless you get permission from the owner of the copyright in the song. As far as we can tell you didn’t do that. Maybe you got so busy with the campaign that you just forgot. But that’s not OK.

“Second, under that same United States Copyright Act, you’re not allowed to take someone’s song and change the lyrics. This is not to say you’re not allowed to write silly lyrics, you just have to write them to your own music. Now, I know why you used Joe’s music – it’s undoubtedly because it’s a lot better than any music you or your staff could have written. But that’s the point. Since Joe writes better songs than you do, the Copryright Act rewards him by letting him decide who gets to use the songs he writes.”

The response from the campaign manager for Joe Walsh (politician) slightly misses the point: “Obviously, it’s not using the original Joe Walsh lyrics or anything”.

This could turn into the sort of battle that ends up as a concept album, featuring both Joe Walshes!