steely dan 1973

[Fritz]

My Old School on Dick Clark.

Skunk tunes up around 1:40. giggle.
Nice Firebird with Becker.
The ladies (porky & bucky) stomping time in their platforms.
Neither seem to show up in the All Music Guide. Perhaps they only did live.
But they can be found in the Steely Dan database

I saw Steely Dan on a double at Avery Fisher in '76 (I think) with the very drunk ELO. Steely Dan (who I wasn't much on at the time) were very tight.
ELO were very drunk.

Ah, the days of spending big $ (15?) to see your fave band so blasted, they c'u'n’t lie down without holding on.
Saw the Kinks around this time in the same condition. They were just getting back into America.

[SteveG]

Personally, I've always thought they sounded kinda whiny.

[hal]

disappointed in that lipsync shit

here's some good stuff from 1974 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WTh_IEyU1w

[pdq]

Steve G. wrote:
Personally, I've always thought they sounded kinda whiny.

Steely Dan? “Whiny”?

:S

They’re my personal favorite group of all time (at least, at this time). Quite the opposite of “whiny”, to me a classic Dan song documents folks on the edge, usually with a prominent guitar riff (by Becker) and complementary or supporting keyboards (by Fagen), done in a jazz-flavored or fusion style encompassed within a very high quality recording.

Like, Don’t Take Me Alive. Or Kid Charlemagne.

Very little moon and June in their lyrics, and almost no sappy love songs. The closest things to love songs they do inevitably also have an edge, like Rikki Don’t Lose That Number, Janie Runaway (The “wunderwaif of Gramercy Park”), or Gaslighting [current SO] Abby in favor of the hot new interest.

The last song on their last album (before Becker died) was called “Everything Must Go” which could just as well have been called all good things must pass. It was nice up on the ladder, til that ill wind started blowing; now it’s cozy down below. But we’re going out of business - everything must go.

Erudite, sometimes inscrutable, and almost always tight. But never whiny. And for the life of me, (except songs where they have Michael McDonald doing his formless, undistinguished background singing) I don’t know why they get pigeonholed into yacht rock.

But YMMV.

[Thrift Store Scott]

Pdq, I can see both sides of your argument. I appreciate Steely Dan way more now than I did when they were popular. Amid the much more bombastic offerings from Boston, Styx, Aerosmith, Van Halen, etc., at the time, unless you really paid attention to them the more subtle charm of Steely Dan songs was easily overlooked, especially with some of their later, more melodic works such as "Hey 19". It wasn't until someone whose other opinions on music I respected sat me down and forced me to really listen to Steely Dan's stuff, paying close attention to the lyrics in particular, that I began to see them in a more flattering light.

[Will Collier]

I was way too young to see Steely Dan play live in the 70's, but caught most of the tours in the 90's and 2000's, at least until the set lists started to get stale about five years ago. Have not seen the full band since Walter passed, although we did go to Fagan's solo tour (with a very young backing band) a while back.

Was lucky enough to be at this show, the first time they ever played "Aja" all the way through, then surprised the crowd by also playing all of "The Royal Scam," which hadn't been on the bill. Amazing night.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3l5Cp9cvVRg

[Will Collier]

There's also this:

https://twitter.com/phlaimeaux/status/15...6393856001

[August West]

Thanks for the thread and links Fritz and Will. Nice Saturday listen. I was a little young to really collect any Steely Dan.

[bfd]

Missing a few horns there, unless Becker is just crankin' 'em… miley-excited001: