Steely Dan

[LNX]

and I'm laughing at the frozen rain.

Fagen getting his Lynn Benfield on

[Depressed Beyond Tables]

'Well I crossed my old man back in Oregon - Don't take me alive'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gV1sxB8TxI

[grassbath]

Despite loving Reelin' in the Years I'd always written the rest off as immaculately made but lacking in feeling. Listening again as a result of this thread, boy was I wrong. When those fucking harmonies come in on the chorus of Dirty Work it's enough to bring you to tears.

[Nowhere Man]

They are fan fucking tastic. I haven't listened to their last two albums yet but its crazy how over those first seven albums, there's nothing I could truly call a 'bad' song. One of the most consistent Pop[nb]using the term loosely there.[/nb] bands I can think of

I've listened to Aja the most (and Gaucho the least) but all of them are pretty fab.

[Mini]

Can anyone make sense of Fagen's sarcastic-cool lyrics? I know that Kid Charlemagne is about San Francisco LSD manufacturer extraordinaire Owsley Stanley and Hey Nineteen is about dating a 19-year-old and having to explain cultural references to her. "Hey 19, that's 'Retha Franklin..."

[greenman]

My Old School is about being set up for a drugs bust by his collage hence not wanting to go back for graduation.

[grassbath]

Just popping back into this thread to register the complete obsession with this band that has taken hold of me over the last couple of months. Every new album I hear has been met initially with 'okay, this must be the point I get off, it's getting a bit too slick now,' but certain tracks or moments pull me back and suddenly I find can't listen to anything else. I think they may be my favourite lyricists ever. Latest obsession - Gaucho (the song). Fagen's worried-love resentful missive to Becker, who has run off with heroin and left him 'high in the Custerdome' to deal with lawsuits and corporate vampires at the commercial apex of their career? Don't know - but it's bloody brilliant.

Aja and Countdown to Ecstasy are the most consistent and fully realised, I reckon (and the Nightfly, if that can be counted). Katy Lied and Pretzel Logic are beautiful (Rikki, Major Dude, Bad Sneakers, Doctor bloody Wu!) but a little frontloaded quality-wise. Royal Scam and Can't Buy a Thrill seem patchier, with really obvious standouts.

'This is the day of the expanding man
That shape is my shade, there where I used to stand'

[lazyhour]

Nice post. The Royal Scam is one of my faves, but it did take quite a while to click, as did Katy Lied.

[jake thunder]

Latest obsession - Gaucho (the song). Fagen's worried-love resentful missive to Becker, who has run off with heroin and left him 'high in the Custerdome' to deal with lawsuits and corporate vampires at the commercial apex of their career? Don't know - but it's bloody brilliant.

It's a total smash. Absolutely perfect performances by all the players.

However, I think the lyrics are about a gay couple having an argument when one of them brings home another chap (a bodacious cowboy) who wears a spangled leather poncho and elevator shoes. Could be a metaphor for Becker and Fagen's relationship but I reckon this is a Becker lyric.
I imagine the "Custerdome" is the couple's expensive high rise apartment.

[Rizla]

Who else could write such a beautiful song about a porn stash? Great demo version below...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gD8YGJARmY

[greenman]

Just popping back into this thread to register the complete obsession with this band that has taken hold of me over the last couple of months. Every new album I hear has been met initially with 'okay, this must be the point I get off, it's getting a bit too slick now,' but certain tracks or moments pull me back and suddenly I find can't listen to anything else. I think they may be my favourite lyricists ever. Latest obsession - Gaucho (the song). Fagen's worried-love resentful missive to Becker, who has run off with heroin and left him 'high in the Custerdome' to deal with lawsuits and corporate vampires at the commercial apex of their career? Don't know - but it's bloody brilliant.

Aja and Countdown to Ecstasy are the most consistent and fully realised, I reckon (and the Nightfly, if that can be counted). Katy Lied and Pretzel Logic are beautiful (Rikki, Major Dude, Bad Sneakers, Doctor bloody Wu!) but a little frontloaded quality-wise. Royal Scam and Can't Buy a Thrill seem patchier, with really obvious standouts.

'This is the day of the expanding man
That shape is my shade, there where I used to stand'

I don't really agree with Katie Lied being front loaded, indeed that's a pretty unique album in that my least favourite tracks are the first and last, Your Gold Teeth II and Any World That I'm Welcome To are two of the best tracks on the album though for me, the latter perhaps a contender for my favourite Dan song.

I tend to view Pretzel Logic as the more front loaded album, first four tracks are brilliant yet I would say beyond that only the title track is anything like as good.

Theres nothing I actively dislike by them but I feel Royale Scam and Gaucho don't have as much behind the slickness unlike Aja(especially Home At Last, another contender for my favourite by them) and the Nightfly.

[Mini]

Yeah I think Pretzel Logic is easily their weakest album. It contains some of their best tracks but more of their worst than any other record.

EDIT I'm talking about their original run of albums here - I've not really heard their last 2.

[grassbath]

It's a total smash. Absolutely perfect performances by all the players.

However, I think the lyrics are about a gay couple having an argument when one of them brings home another chap (a bodacious cowboy) who wears a spangled leather poncho and elevator shoes. Could be a metaphor for Becker and Fagen's relationship but I reckon this is a Becker lyric.
I imagine the "Custerdome" is the couple's expensive high rise apartment.

Indeed. I'd heard that interpretation before, but given Becker's reported absence from much of the Gaucho sessions and Fagen's reported irritation with him, the purchase of the Dan catalogue by a bigger and more powerful label, and the general sonic resemblance of the album to solo Fagen, I think it works really convincingly on both levels. 'What'd I tell you, back down the line, I'll scratch your back you can scratch mine' - typical Dan snarkily humorous reference to gay sex, but also possibly a comment on their songwriting partnership, which always seems to have been based on a strong agreement not to claim individual contributions/credit.
Then 'who is the Gaucho' - the voice of the record company/New York session players ('heavy rollers') interrogating Fagen ('can't you see they're laughing at me, get rid of him') as to why he's still sharing the credit with his strung-out partner? Both readings explain the duo's reluctance to explain the song's meaning, apart from the image of the Custerdome, which apparently holds no reference to anything external, and so may be a shared in-joke/metaphor for the industry. Maybe I'm stretching, but this is the specific beauty of the Dan I guess - not only that the lyrics can be read in multiple ways, but that they conflate cruel, satirical caricatures with melancholy, vulnerable self-reflections (other notable case in point: Deacon Blues).

I don't really agree with Katie Lied being front loaded, indeed that's a pretty unique album in that my least favourite tracks are the first and last, Your Gold Teeth II and Any World That I'm Welcome To are two of the best tracks on the album though for me, the latter perhaps a contender for my favourite Dan song.
I tend to view Pretzel Logic as the more front loaded album, first four tracks are brilliant yet I would say beyond that only the title track is anything like as good.

Pretzel Logic seems to get a lot of praise for its catchy and concise songs, as well as its historical status as the album where they really proved their uniqueness and staying power (top 5 single 'Rikki' sharing a side with a Duke Ellington cover, transcending the touring band format, etc.). Agreed, though, that the album takes a pretty steep nosedive around 'Parker's Band,' and that Katy Lied is a more even spread. 'Your Gold Teeth II' is just stupendous, those words are beautiful. Can't really get on board with 'Any World' though - that's one where the Michael McDonald backing vocals really are too overpowering for my taste.

[grassbath]

And while I'm going off on one, can I also put in a word for Fagen as a singer? I know he was insecure about his voice and is often subject to criticisms of being inexpressive or unpleasantly nasal. It seems to me that not only did his tone suit the music (and band image) perfectly, but by the time of the Nightfly had become a diversely textured studio instrument - alternating between cynical, adenoidal character-acting and velvety harmonies on 'The Goodbye Look' and the title track. Any singer would have been cowed in front of all these top-class musicians. And, save for maybe Dylan, nobody has the ability to make a line so totally with delivery alone:

'Hey fell-LAH! You tearin' up the street, you wear that white tuxedo how you gon' beat the heat?'

'All aboard, the Carib Cannibal, off to Barbadoooos, just for the ride'

'I am holding a mystical spheeeeeeere [...] It's perfection and GRACE. It's the smile on my FACE'

'And for the coupe de graaaaace, they're outRAGEOUS ohhoneyletmetellyou...'

[greenman]

I do actually think Fagen judged what worked pretty well though the tracks he doesn't sing on Can't Buy a Thrill do work with the alternate vocalists, Midnight Cruiser and Brooklyn Owes The Charmer especially.

[greenman]

Listening to the Royal Scam for the first time in awhile perhaps I was a bit harsh there, I remember loving The Caves of Altamira and Don't Take Me Alive but the title track at the end is actually a belter as well, don't think its helped by the most well known tracks not being the strongest(especially Haitian Divorce that's not far off Dreadlock Holiday).

[Mini]

Listening to the Royal Scam for the first time in awhile perhaps I was a bit harsh there, I remember loving The Caves of Altamira and Don't Take Me Alive but the title track at the end is actually a belter as well, don't think its helped by the most well known tracks not being the strongest(especially Haitian Divorce that's not far off Dreadlock Holiday).

Kid Charlemagne, Green Earrings and Sign in Stranger are great too. "You zombie, be born again my friend!"

[greenman]

Kid Charlemagne is definitely the best of the three singles from that album although as with Black Friday on Katy Lied it feels a little like a bit of a compromise towards simpler rockier material,  the two following tracks I mentioned I think play to there strengths more in that era and feel more complete for it. Green Earrings and Sign in Stranger and pleasant enough but feel a bit lacking in ideas to me compared to the title track as less structured jazzy pieces.

Generally I tend to take the view that Aja really wasn't as big a shift as its talked up so much as the band having the confidence to give prominence to the sound they'd been building up on the previous two albums.

[Mini]

I love The Caves of Altamira and Don't Take Me Alive as well, along with the funkier numbers. I think FM (No Static At All) is one of their best.

Has anyone mentioned Babylon Sisters yet? That must be one of my favourite songs of all time. It's so dreamy and atmospheric and perfect. "Drive west on Sunset to the sea..." It always gives me chills.

[Stoneage Dinosaurs]

And while I'm going off on one, can I also put in a word for Fagen as a singer? I know he was insecure about his voice and is often subject to criticisms of being inexpressive or unpleasantly nasal. It seems to me that not only did his tone suit the music (and band image) perfectly, but by the time of the Nightfly had become a diversely textured studio instrument - alternating between cynical, adenoidal character-acting and velvety harmonies on 'The Goodbye Look' and the title track. Any singer would have been cowed in front of all these top-class musicians. And, save for maybe Dylan, nobody has the ability to make a line so totally with delivery alone:

'I am holding a mystical spheeeeeeere [...] It's perfection and GRACE. It's the smile on my FACE'

Although on the other hand, on the same song in the second chorus it sounds like he's singing "It's the light in my arse"

[greenman]

I love The Caves of Altamira and Don't Take Me Alive as well, along with the funkier numbers. I think FM (No Static At All) is one of their best.

Has anyone mentioned Babylon Sisters yet? That must be one of my favourite songs of all time. It's so dreamy and atmospheric and perfect. "Drive west on Sunset to the sea..." It always gives me chills.

I prefer it to the Royal Scam singles but I actually think FM being on a separate soundtrack and single benefited Aja quite a bit, again I think a bit of an attempt at something more straight ahead pop/rock leaving the album to focus entirely on the denser jazzy pop.

I would say the same with Hey Nineteen on Gaucho although Time Out of Mind is more interesting for me, again I'd say best tracks on that album by some way aren't the singles but as you say Babylon Sisters and the title track(which I think gives more heart than anything else).

To lower the tone I'd say my top 25 tracks by them are...

Do it Again
Midnight Cruiser
Reelin In The Years
Brooklyn Owes the Charmer
Kings
Bodhisattva
The Boston Rag
My Old School
Rikki Don't Lose That Number
Night by Night
Any Major Dude WIll Tell You
Pretzel Logic
Bad Sneakers
Rose Darling
Dr Wu
Your Gold Teeth II
Any World(That I'm Welcome To)
The Caves of Altamira
Don't Take Me Alive
Black Cow
Aja
Peg
Home At Last
Babylon Sisters
Gaucho

[Depressed Beyond Tables]

The guitar solo in Kings is one of my all time favourites.

With A Gun is a cracking little tune. There's no fat on it. Just wall to wall solid pop, cleverly written and neatly wrapped up.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbfWXOPKFeg

If The Eagles or Petty/Traveling Wilburys wrote it you'd hear a lot more of it on the radio.

[Howj Begg]

I prefer it to the Royal Scam singles but I actually think FM being on a separate soundtrack and single benefited Aja quite a bit, again I think a bit of an attempt at something more straight ahead pop/rock leaving the album to focus entirely on the denser jazzy pop.

I would say the same with Hey Nineteen on Gaucho although Time Out of Mind is more interesting for me, again I'd say best tracks on that album by some way aren't the singles but as you say Babylon Sisters and the title track(which I think gives more heart than anything else).

To lower the tone I'd say my top 25 tracks by them are...

Do it Again
Midnight Cruiser
Reelin In The Years
Brooklyn Owes the Charmer
Kings
Bodhisattva
The Boston Rag
My Old School
Rikki Don't Lose That Number
Night by Night
Any Major Dude WIll Tell You
Pretzel Logic
Bad Sneakers
Rose Darling
Dr Wu
Your Gold Teeth II
Any World(That I'm Welcome To)
The Caves of Altamira
Don't Take Me Alive
Black Cow
Aja
Peg
Home At Last
Babylon Sisters
Gaucho

Your list does not contain Deacon Blues or FM and is therefore invalid.

Nah but good list otherwise. I used to think it was possible to have a favourite Dan album (Aja or Countdown) but isn't. Their best tracks are spread throughout their 70s catalogue.

[greenman]

Honestly I never quite understood the elevation of Deacon Blues over the rest of that album beyond obviously being a single. It works very well on the album as a whole but I;d say really more by playing into the general atmosphere whilst the tracks around it for me have more substance(Aja I think has more direction than most of there tracks with lengthy jazzy instrumental sections like Green Earrings or the first Your Gold Teeth) to them for me.

Generally my view would be that latter Steely Dan isn't nearly as well represented by the "greatest hits/best of" approach as the early years. Can't Buy A Thrill definitely has a lot of gems on it that don't get attension but the following two albums best tracks get most attention whilst I think after that it tends to be simpler material that gets more focus(Black Friday, Haitian Divorce, FM, Hey Nineteen, etc)

[Mini]

Any thoughts on Alive in America? They're probably too far past their peak but there are great versions of Aja and Josie. I love a drum solo though.

[greenman]

Some of the rearrangements like Reelin In the Years are interesting if perhaps not as good as the originals, as you say the version of Aja is excellent as well and again I would say that track is there best piece of extended instrumental work.

[Phoenix Lazarus]

Anyone else really like Haitian Divorce?  I've loved that since I was seven, when it was first in the charts.

[greenman]

Again always felt a little too close to Dreadlock Holiday to me, not as offensive lyrically but generally reggae seemed to be the rocks that pretty much every big 70's act hit into at some stage.

Albums wise I'd agree lists are probably even more irrelevant than normal, generally I would say Can't Buy A Thrill, Katy Lied and Aja would be a cut above for me in terms of consistent quality. Besides them I would say I listen to Countdown to Ecstasy and Pretzel Logic more than the Royal Scam and Gaucho but with more of a tendency to jump between the better tracks where as whilst the latter two have fewer highpoints the slickness does make complete listening more enjoyable.

[grassbath]

I think FM (No Static At All) is one of their best.

Agreed, that intro is one of the most magical instrumental passages in their catalogue. Also I love how lyrically/thematically it's a sort of manifesto for what they'd be doing on Gaucho - if the music's slick enough, you can get away with material as nasty and cynical as you want because people don't listen. Which is how I suppose songs about nineteen-year old prostitutes, 'fine Colombian' and 'chasing the dragon' ended up pouring out of supermarket speakers like honey. The strings on FM also work a charm, which is nice given that Becker and Fagen always seemed a bit awkward and reluctant to arrange with strings (Through With Buzz comes to mind).

Honestly I never quite understood the elevation of Deacon Blues over the rest of that album beyond obviously being a single. It works very well on the album as a whole but I;d say really more by playing into the general atmosphere whilst the tracks around it for me have more substance(Aja I think has more direction than most of there tracks with lengthy jazzy instrumental sections like Green Earrings or the first Your Gold Teeth) to them for me.

For me, with Deacon Blues it's all about the lyrics, and the little musical details, which make it the greatest song on that record (tied maybe with Peg). The melody is hardly their most grabbing and it's definitely more of an atmosphere piece than a lot of their biggest and most acclaimed songs, but it seems to distill so many of the Dan's lyrical fascinations down into one perfectly shaped character and sentiment. And it just SOUNDS amazing, a perfect example of their production and arrangement alchemy of the time, so deep and rich and detailed. So much emotional drama gets generated, yet so subtly, when those close, warm horns shift chords. The way the drums start up a steady, polite rhythm on the ride when the chorus kicks in. It's so dreamlike - almost 'psychedelic' in its jaded, boozed-out sort of way.

[Janie Jones]

I think I remember reading in the music press at the time the irony of Gaucho having such a slickly produced LA feel when it was recorded in NYC. Whereas Aja which has a more gritty east coast feel was recorded in California.

Previous Steely Dan thread
http://www.cookdandbombd.co.uk/forums/index.php/topic,29325.msg1527136.html#msg1527136