“Outlaw Lawyer” Neil Reshen Has Passed Away
Neil Reshen, Waylon Jennings, and Willie Nelson in a previously-unpublished photo supplied by the Reshen family.
“There was a time when Neil fed me and Willie, and if it hadn’t been for him, I don’t know what we would have done. He helped us immeasurably. He got things for us that no country singer had ever gotten before. If we were going to become Outlaws, though we didn’t know that yet, we needed an Outlaw Lawyer, as Willie called him.
“Neil was perfect for the part. He was like a mad dog on a leash. When he got his teeth into something, he never let go.”
–Waylon Jennings
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The lawyer who was at the very center of revolutionizing country music in the mid 70’s as part of the Outlaw movement with Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings, has passed away. Neil C. Reshen, the man who negotiated Willie Nelson out of his RCA contract, and also helped negotiate the creative freedom for Waylon Jennings within RCA, passed away on Sunday, December 6th after a long battle with Altzeimer’s Disease. Neil was also the manager for musicians as far ranging as Miles Davis, Frank Zappa, David Allan Coe, and The Velvet Underground throughout his legendary and influential career. He was 75-years-old.
Neil Reshen’s impact on country music was enormous. Below is an obituary for Neil Reshen supplied to Saving Country by Reshen’s family.
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RIP Neil C. Reshen: March 3, 1939-December 6, 2014
Neil graduated from City College of New York and was a pioneer in the business management field of the music industry. Neil was the management backbone of the “Outlaw Country” movement which developed in the 1970s. He forced record companies to give Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings 100% artistic control over their music, allowing for such albums as Stardust (by Nelson) and I’ve Always Been Crazy (by Jennings) to be created. Over his career he also managed many musicians such as Miles Davis, Frank Zappa, The Mothers of Invention, Alice Cooper, Buddy Miles, David Allan Coe, Jessi Colter, Linda Ronstadt and The Stone Ponys, The Cowsills, Captain Beefheart, Bernard Purdie, Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs, Tim Buckley and the Velvet Underground. Neil also managed artists and authors such as Peter Max, Andy Warhol, Olivia DeBernadinis, Roger Kahn, and Peter Golenbock and even the famous Creem Magazine and founder Barry Kramer.
In his later career he founded Benay Enterprises and managed many corporations and individuals with his partner and daughter, Dawn Reshen-Doty, who is now President of Benay.
Neil Reshen passed away Saturday December 6 after a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease. He is survived by his daughters Dawn Reshen-Doty of Danbury, CT and Amber Bezahler of Los Angeles, CA, Grandson Justin Slaughter Doty of Danbury, CT, Godson Olufemi Adedeji and ex-wife Barrie Adedeji, both of New York. He also leaves behind two brothers, Bruce Reshen of Fairfield, CT and Mark Reshen, of Hollywood, FL. He was predeceased by ex-wife Patricia Reshen.
Neil Reshen died once before, in 1959, when his parents sat Shiva over his marriage to first wife Barrie. Together they defied cultural norms and entered into a marriage that broke cultural and racial barriers. Neil was many times born again, living through two open-heart surgeries, colon cancer and many other ailments. The fuel for these many lives was friends, family, his children, and numerous German Shepherds.
As Neil was a great lover of dogs always having at least three German shepherds in house at a time donations may be made in his name to the Humane Society. A memorial service to celebrate his life will be held on January 7th, 2015 at the Plaza Jewish Community Chapel, 603 Amsterdam Avenue, NYC at 3 PM.
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Out of all of Neil’s accomplishments, his negotiation with RCA and Chet Atkins on behalf of Waylon Jennings might be his most legendary. As Waylon Jennings recalled in his autobiography:
It was down to a $25,000 sum, and they (RCA) were not going to give it to me. He (Neil) wanted it. We were setting there, not a word spoken, and the silence got unbearable. After a while I couldn’t take it anymore. “Chet,” I said, reaching over to a bowl on his desk, “where’d you get these peanuts?”
Neil glared at me. “Shut up, Waylon.”
You could hear a clock tick in the room. It got even quieter. Minutes passed. I rose up, never said a word, walked out. I went to the bathroom to take a leak. When I came back, Neil greeted me in the hall. “You’re a ******* genius,” he said.
“Walking out like that sewed it up. That was a $25,000 piss.” said Neil. “They asked me where you went and I told them I didn’t know. Waylon’s mad, I’m sure. He’s crazy. He’s liable to do anything. . . And that’s when they gave us the money.
Though Neil Reshen might not be a name everyone recognizes, you can make an honest case that without him, the “Outlaw” movement in country music never happens, and neither do many of the iconic albums, songs, and careers of that era.
December 8, 2014 @ 3:30 am
Rest in Peace Mr. Reshen. Thankful for what you did for the outlaw movement. We woulda missed out on a whole lotta great music without you.
December 8, 2014 @ 11:57 am
I just want to know who was driving the Pinto wagon in the background.
December 8, 2014 @ 12:43 pm
May he rest in peace. We need tough, smart, and principled people like this to level the playing field between artist and record label.
December 8, 2014 @ 2:12 pm
Well said.
Thanks for covering this, Trigger.
Rest in peace, Mr. Reshen.
December 8, 2014 @ 3:34 pm
I like old stories like that one. Does any know where he was going with the whole bowl of peanuts thing? Don’t know if that one flew right over my head or if im reading into nothing….
December 8, 2014 @ 4:03 pm
I think he was just trying to make small talk to ease the tension, which Mr. Reshen apparently wasn’t in favor of.
December 8, 2014 @ 7:52 pm
Neither side wanted to budge, and it wasn’t until Waylon got up to take a leak that Chet Atkins and crew budged.
Reshen could have just sat silent and said nothing, but he seized the opportunity to close the deal when Waylon walked out. No one knew where he was going, including Reshen, but he used it to his advantage.
Quite clever, really. It didn’t seem to me like Waylon deliberately set out to break the stalemate, but he did, and Reshen pounced.
That’s someone who can think on their feet!
December 9, 2014 @ 10:25 am
I’ve always had a hard time reconciling Chet Atkins’ musical contributions with his unscrupulous business dealings. You would think that a real artist, like Atkins, would be more sympathetic and understanding of the position of the artist in a recording contract. Maybe he was just a greedy person.
December 9, 2014 @ 12:12 pm
Atkins was answering to his bosses in New York. He was doing so willingly, but he was just following orders. That is why country music artists traditionally had less control, because there was an extra layer of management in Nashville that had to make sure money kept flowing back to the two coasts. Neil Reshen changed all of that.
December 13, 2014 @ 12:18 pm
Well, once again a case to separate the art from the artist. It’s also been said Buck Owens was notoriously difficult to deal with as well.
I think people tend to think they know what someone is like from their public persona, when in fact they may be completely different in other situations. It’s human nature, I suppose.
June 7, 2017 @ 9:18 am
LOL! I came here the long way round. A June 2017 story about Bobby Bare on this site cited his influence to the outlaw movement. A commenter pointed to a CMT video about the Outlaw album. The video referred to Neil Reshen, who I was unfamiliar with and searched his name. The second link brought me back here to Saving Country Music. Full circle, unbroken.
June 7, 2017 @ 10:16 am
This makes me happy Greg.
January 24, 2025 @ 7:39 am
Neil was also the one most responsible for Willie’s “Red Headed Stranger” album and country’s first “traditional” #1 hit in 30 years breaking out, “Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain”. Columbia wanted to add “production” with strings, horns and Billy Sherrill overseeing the project. Waylon & Neil called the executives “tin eared SOB’s” and told them Willie was leaving the label if they didn’t leave the record just the way Willie made it in Garland, TX.