Steely Dan: "Steely Dan's name has been popping up as a hip musical crush. Remember, this glossy bop-pop was the indifferent aristocracy to punk rock's stone-throwing in the late 70's. People fought

I could do without the whole second side, excepting the title track.

it’s the only one besides RS I’ve never been obsessed with for weeks on end. I love them both (Scam slightly more), but i can’t say either have ever rotated through my ever-changing favorite 3 or so

i love morph the cat! not that i could tell you why or anything about the songs, really. just enjoy the floating, drifting nature of it, plus it just sounds pretty as hell.

anyway looking forward to this, love the title, feels like an abstract of the greater fagen/becker lyrical project

― emo canon in twee major (BradNelson), Friday, August 24, 2012 2:16 PM (eight years ago) bookmarkflaglink

morph the cat is the only fagen record i wouldn't recommend, the songs kinda go nowhere. sunken condos is funky and great

― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Monday, August 15, 2016 12:06 PM (four years ago) bookmarkflaglink

What happened, Brad?

Nothing on The Royal Scam has ever really clicked for me. It's too, I dunno, antsy or something?

idk i’m a big enough dan fan that i got really into morph the cat at the start of the decade but i gradually realized the songs aren’t really there

It's my least favorite SD-associated album.

I struggled with 'Gaucho' (the song) at first but I love it now, it's so grandiose and ridiculous (in a good way).'My Rival' on the other hand is a song I enjoy but definitely one where I can sort of see that the band's detractors have a point, the organ solo is pretty bad.

The outright bad songs though, yeah I'd agree with 'Everything You Did' and some of the ones on Pretzel Logic - 'East St. Louis' and 'With a Gun' as well as 'Monkey...'.

Preztel Logic is the one I'm just sorta getting around to in 2020, several years after my original Dan rush. No beef with it, I just kept not finding copies of it at the record store! It's got some pretty awesome songs so I figure if I give it enough spins my brain will get aligned with it.

Royal Scam def has some of my least beloved Steely Dan songs when I'm just scanning the titles and thinking about them (Sign in Stranger, Everything You Did, the title track) but then when I put it on I'm like "ehhh this record's still kind of a jam." It helps that the first three tracks are just monsters, and that "Haitian Divorce" is such a huge earworm for me.

I struggled with 'Gaucho' (the song) at first but I love it now, it's so grandiose and ridiculous (in a good way).

Yeah, same. Especially love how the ridiculousness is buoyed by all-too-real lines that could have been lifted from any petty domestic squabble.

No he can't sleep on the floor
What do you think I'm yelling for?
I'll drop him near the freeway
Doesn't he have a home?

And

Don't tell me he'll wait in the car!

Get rid of him!

Bad Sneakers is a major vibe

My favourite Fagen solo song (post-Nightfly) is The Night Belongs to Mona from Morph the Cat. Its portrait of depression makes me wonder if it was inspired by his stepson whose story is mentioned in Eminent Hipsters, and who would die in 2009. The characters in too many of his other songs of the period are cartoons of Randy Older Guy and Hot Young Chick.

Someone upthread mentioned American Lovers on Thomas Jefferson Kaye's First Grade from 1974. Jones is also another great Becker/Fagen song on that album, a portrait of 70s affluent anomie that's basically The Ice Storm in a song. Or Billy Joel's Captain Jack sans masturbation and nose-picking.

pretzel logic was mostly leftovers from the first two album from what I read and yeah it shows. still pretty good but yeah my least favorite of the originals. Never spent any time with the reunion lps.

4. My Rival - dumb "humour", hammy vocal, irritating organ solo

the organ tone is incredible on this song smh

Am I really going to have to comb through their discography to find my least favorite tracks now? I know it would at least include "I Got The News".

I'm sure I've mentioned this here before, but part of my enjoyment of "My Rival" is imagining that said rival is Billy Joel.

my rival is good as hell

"i got the news" was a song i didn't get until i tried to jam on it with some friends, and it was very much fun trying to keep up with that jerky rhythm and close keyboard clusters. so now i'm a fan.

@ Moodles - you definitely have! Back in the ballot poll thread. "Surely Anthony's Bar and Grill is owned by the guy from Movin' Out." it's all I think about whenever I hear that song!

5. Through With Buzz - borderline, may be too weird and short to be bad

this is one of the best pretzel logic tracks, the second part of your description is correct

i still keep hearing it as "Through With Bugs," and specifically, chapter-book supervillain Bugs Meany.

"I Got the News" = ideal car jam, especially when driving + shaking your shoulders and hips.

Lol, Doc C., I truly have like 5 insights into music that I will keep coming back to until I'm dead.

you just summed up my ILM posting history, to be clear

also just remembered that i think on first hearing I had it as "Through With Bubs," as in the Homestarrunner character.

my rival is good as hell

― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Thursday, December 3, 2020 11:09 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

sure, he's jahh-ly rah-ger, until he answers for his crime!

Does anyone know why Glamour Profession has a reputation for being hated? I would love it just for the guitar solo and riff on the fade-out.

i'd guess it's an easy target for those who don't like gaucho because of its length and ultra-smooth sheen.

Brut and charisma

I love "Glamour Profession".

I think I'd have to add "Show Biz Kids" to my most hated list. That "lost wages" gag grows old real quick.

Brut and charisma

― A-B-C. A-Always, B-Be, C-Chooglin (will), Thursday, December 3, 2020 11:34 AM (eight minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

poured from the shadow where he stood

cannot imagine disliking “showbiz kids” but go off

it's probably my least fav on that album, but i definitely do not dislike it

Speaking of misheard lyrics, I kept hearing the Gaucho line as "who is the gauchorino?" until I finally pulled out the lyrics sheet last week to enlighten myself.

(there is a missing syllable when they sing "who is the gaucho, amigo?')

after closing time
at the guernsey fair
i detect the el supremo
from the room at the top of the stairs

Speaking of misheard lyrics, I kept hearing the Gaucho line as "who is the gauchorino?" until I finally pulled out the lyrics sheet last week to enlighten myself.

(there is a missing syllable when they sing "who is the gaucho, amigo?')

― enochroot, Thursday, December 3, 2020 10:54 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Not to be rude, but you might want to get your ears checked.

the syllable is definitely there, but the first syllable of "gaucho" is elongated and the second syllable is mushed together with the next word so it sounds like a single-word "choamigo"

Exactly. It's not dropped, but ellided.

Through with pugs

I can't imagine liking Steely Dan but not liking the song Gaucho.

Does anyone know why Glamour Profession has a reputation for being hated? I would love it just for the guitar solo and riff on the fade-out.

― Halfway there but for you, Thursday, December 3, 2020 1:27 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

When I first heard Glamour Profession, I didn't like the monotony and I didn't like the voice that Fagen puts on for it, which is even more nasal than his usual voice. I later came to realize that those qualities were inherent to the song's charm.

I'm more of a fan of the rockin' Dan albums: the first three plus Royal Scam. I rarely play Katy Lied, Aja or Gaucho, though they all have some tunes I like. But the Dan albums I like, I really like.

Steely Dan had much too much “skill”, “creativity,” “musicianship” to ever escape their own “gravity” and their own “ideas.” Theirs is a very self-conscious music. It can never get away from itself. The listener is only confirmed. This makes their music a mule. Do you see? Xo

— Jerry Saltz (@jerrysaltz) December 4, 2020

steely dan is too "good" for some "asshole" like jerry saltz to "understand"

extremely sorry for bringing jerry saltz to to this board

haha

People liked that one autobiographical thing he wrote but yeah.

I have two old collections of his art criticism from the Voice that still hold up. I think he disappeared up his own ass around the time he moved to New York magazine and became a reality TV show judge.

He's sometimes amusing, which is about all you can ask from a Twitter personage. I enjoyed his totally insane coffee routine, I think it may have been linked from the Coffee thread.

hmm seems like he is as exacting his coffee as the dan was with their music