Classical Composer Reacts to STEELY DAN: AJA (side 2): Peg, Home At Last, I Got The News, & Josie
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In this #masterpiecefriday edition of #thedailydoug, I'm completing my full album review of Aja by Steely Dan. Today, we're listening to side 2, with the songs Peg, Home at Last, I Got the News, and Josie. I loved this side as much if not better than the first. All the songs are top notch and expertly played. It's a true historic album! (Ep. 848)
Reference Video: • Aja
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your next reaction is guacho probably my second fave album and of course aja is first for me !
Home at Last. Think Homer's "The Odyssey", that tired sea song. Odysseus is sailing home from Troy, wants to hear the Siren's song, plugs his crew's ears with wax so they can''t hear the Sirens, and has his crew tie him to the mast so that he (Odysseus) won't be able to have the ship steered into the rocks. So powerful is the song of the Sirens that Ody thinks he is already home.
"Hey guys, you can let me down now. No more rocks.. Hey guys! Guys?"
Donald Fagan for Musician Laureate!
It's a metaphor for LA.
Chuck Rainy is unbelievable on these tracks... I forgot how great he is. Also, I really, really love the Horn arrangements on all of these tracks. Thanks Doug!
Aimee Nolte breaks this tune down and shows that Peg is a blues, very interesting. Home at Last is a retelling of the Greek myth of Ulysses. And last, please, if you haven't already, do The Royal Scam!
Great tunes and a killer solo by Larry Carlton on Kid Charlemagne.
Jay Graydon has a YT vid breaking down his solo on "Peg"... yes, he mentions it as a Blues, as well.
Altered blues for sure. That was the advice Donald gave Jay Graydon when recording the solo. "think blues." Then he got it!
There was a “classic albums” dvd made around 2000 about the making of this record. You should watch and react to it, it’s on TH-cam and it’s incredible especially for musicians and big fans of the band
That whole series was great!
Uptown baby, uptown baby
Classic Albums was a fantastic show and the one about Aja was (IMO) the best. I had to get a copy on DVD so I could watch it whenever I want.
Yes, that was a great video. Any Steely Dan fan should watch it.
Have been listening to this album since 1977, could listen to it every day and not grow tired of it.
Jeff Beck’s “Blow by Blow” is the same for me - could listen to it everyday. Agree with Aja!
The lyrics from Home At Last are reportedly a commentary/summary about Homer's " The Iliad "
Sounds more like the Odyssey to me...tied to the mast...home at last...
@@underwoodvoice9077 yes, I had a brainfart
*_The Odyssey_,, but yeah 🙂
I love most Steely Dan songs, but Home at Last just grabbed me, immediately. The illusions to Homer's The Odyssey are intriguing, but it's just glorious, musically.
"Home at Last" is my favorite song on this album, and I'm pleased that it was never released as a single, so it never got overplayed. Lyrically, the song is based on Homer's Odyssey. (Odysseus had his crew plug their ears with wax as they passed the sirens on the rocks, while Odysseus himself, who could still hear, was tied to the mast so that he would not be able to respond to the sirens.)
Also, what you read on "I Got the News" was not Becker & Fagen. It was from the liner notes (remember those?) written by critic Michael Phalen. I don't think a member of the band would have said anything that negative about their own song on their own new album. In fact, I'm surprised that comment got into the album notes at all.
Battle apple: Unlike many other of Becker & Fagen's imaginary concoctions, we can be fairly sure about this one since Donald Fagen explicitly referenced it in a July 2011 interview with The Wall Street Journal. Quote: "Walter and I both love inventing slang. For example, in 'Josie', there's a street gang using a weapon called the 'battle apple'. It sounded better than any real weapon we could think of."
What exactly a battle apple would look like is left up to the imagination of the listener.
Also: The Apple of Discord is a reference to a mythological event in which three goddesses fought over an apple. Ptolemaeus Chennus wrote that the goddesses fought over who would get a man named Melus ("apple") as her priest. Paris decided in favor of Aphrodite.
“Danger on the rocks has surely passed still I remain tied to the mast” is a reference Greek mythology. Ulysses.
"Black Cow" and "Home At Last" have always been my favorite tracks in this album, which I would not rank among my top three, even though I like all the songs a lot.
The next time you're in a Steely Dan mood I suggest checking out "Any Major Dude Will Tell You" from Pretzel Logic. It's one of my favorites of theirs. Thanks for the content, Doug!
The battle apple is very similar to the holy hand grenade.
Ma favorites on this album are Black cow and I got the news.
Pretty please do album side reactions for the other Steely Dan albums
Compare the lyrics on I Got The News to how bloviated The Kinks' Lola is about the same subject matter.😮
On *_Home at Last_* - Doug - talks over the transition - to the smoothest Purdy Shuffle pocket groove in the history of music. He's in such a hurry to tell you how much he knows - he walks on the flowers at a garden show.
Donald Fagans first solo album after the breakup, The Nightfly, is pure joy. Please do anything from that masterpiece. Take care🙋♂
IGY is one of my all-time favorites - *_"programmed by fella's - with compassion and vision."_* And this was written in about 1976...
His follow-up, Karmakiriad, might even be a little better (even if it's such a strange name and concept)
After GAUCHO, we assumed SD were done.
Then THE NIGHTFLY was released. Wow, we were thrilled.
TBH, Fagen's followup album didn't really float my boat.
Everything they do it perfect
. Well maybe more like 1981- 1982
you gotta do royal scam. More specifically:
- dont take me alive
- caves of altamira
- kid charlemange
are all crazy
I believe he already did Kid Charlemagne
Also Green Earrings! Doug has done Kid Charlemagne.
_Aja_ is Steely Dan's best album, but _Royal Scam_ is my favorite.
Most people don't really talk about Home at Last or I Got the News when talking about this album, but both are gems! Home at Last is one of my favorite songs ever!
I love Home At Last’ So soot. Makes me think of driving late at night in the city.
Yeah, "Home At Last" is easily my favorite song on _Aja_ .
Have a listen to Donald Fagen's album "The Nightfly" too!
Ruby!
One of the best albums ever made tbh
Certainly one of the best produced albums.
Song for song Kati Lied is a close 2nd, a little more on the seedier side, like come on, Everyone's Gone to the Movies, Gold Teeth II, Any World and the whole side 1.
Doug, you nailed it during “Peg” when you said, “the melodies are diatonic but the way the chord voicings move is really sophisticated.” So many of the legendary guitar solos from Steely Dan that I’ve studied are diatonic and even pentatonic-based like any old rock tune, but the sophisticated chords and voice leading make it really stand out.
The bass player on Peg, said he turned his back during the slapping part in the chirus because they said NO Slapping. But they didn't notice and loved it! ahhaha!
Home at Last has the most beautiful chord progression and funky groove.
One of the best albums ever! LOVE IT! So subtle and complex and great lyrics. Best melding of jazz and pop/rock. Aja was introduced to me when I was in to Genesis and YES and it took a minute... but amazing. Thanks you!
The great Chuck Rainey....
His double stops on the intro are sublime.
Rainey's playing on all the Steely Dan stuff is a clinic. I recall being a little miffed when Rainey wasn't used as much on GAUCHO.
The thumb FTW!
"you'll have to ask Chuck about the thumb business"... Classic
Alone, lights off, a glass of red wine and this album on pretty loud. Perfection.
Without a doubt.
Loud enough to sound real, and add in a bit of high quality “smoke” for me please. Listen all the way through.
Josie was always my favorite Steely Dan track. Just love the groove. 😎
Love Steely Dan, but even more Donald Fagen's solo albums. I would love to see you review the solo albums, especially Morph The Cat.
One of the GREATEST albums of all time...
Wonderful - more Steely Dan is always a good thing
Home at Last is my favorite Steely Dan song!
words cannot express how much I love Josie. Possibly on of the coolest guitar parts of all time in that intro.
I Love it: Doug and the Dan :) This had to be the most sophisticated pop music on 70's radio and there was a lot of great music during that time. It's like a homage to 50's jazz with a new flavor mixed with funk. I also love the "Nightfly" which is a wonderful continuation of these themes. I think Doug would like Donald Fagen's solo expression, would like to see that reaction video :)
The lyricon was played most famously by Chuck Greenberg of the New Age 80’s group Shadowfax.
You should really check out Donald Fagan's solo albums. His Nightly album is just as good as anything Steely Dan did and his Kamakiriad was produced by Walter Becker (with Becker playing all the bass and guitar parts). It is a very under rated album and it is essentially a Steely Dan project.
I love all the songs!!! I’d love to hear you analyze their Two Against Nature album. Lots of unusual key modulations!
"Almost Gothic" is right up your alley, then? 🙂 BTW, Rachel, I love your ELP stuff. Even have your global "Sheriff" collaboration saved and on my PLEX server, so I queue it up often. That's a genuine pick-me-upper, great stuff.
Thanks. 🤓 2:01
Doug - Please can you review one of Donald Fagen's solo albums - e.g. "The Nightfly"?
The perversion on Peg when the jilted boyfriend realizes he'll be enthralled by her soft pont picture: "I know I'll love you better." What a classic single and solo. You are correct that Peg is one of those Steely-ized altered blues with jazzy progressions. The title track from Pretzel Logic and Chin Lightning from Katy Lied, and What a Shame About Me from the Grammy winning Two Against Nature are other examples.
I believe that this was Steely Dan's Opus Magnus. High end audiophiles to this day still use this album to test out their amplifiers and speakers even though it was recorded on analog tape.
this one and "Red and Orange" from John Abercrombie's "Timeless."
I grew up with these songs, but listening to them with you makes me feel like I'm hearing them for the first time!
You would probably enjoy the documentary The Making Of Aja, where Walter and Donald, among others, go through track by track giving the insights of how and what they did during the writing and recording of the album. It's on youtube but broken into different parts, still, an insightful and interesting experience, there are things in there you could never know just by listening to the album...
If you want to listen to more gaming music, I'd like to suggest you give "Genshin Impact - Realm of Tranquil Eternity: Inazuma Live Symphony" a listen.
Thank you for the great informative videos!
Home at last is a phenomenal song with the Purdie/Rainey rhythm section doing what it does. Whilst it is ostensible based on the Odyssey, to me it is about PTSD, long before it was identified, and I do wonder how it must have resonated with everyone who had recently returned from Vietnam.
Gaucho is amazing !
Note with the diatonic melody and the voicings and Rick Marotta's drums how Pegs SWINGS. You can really here it in the outtro of chorus repeats. Rock music that swings like jazz. It's nearly miraculous - incredibly complicated music that SOUNDS SIMPLE. Genius.
Notice Marotta doesn’t use any toms or fills? He said he didn’t like the sound of them so simply avoided playing them. Genius.
Peg. . My favorite song about a dude trying to talk a girl into appearing in a p&rn movie. .
YES! That's what it's all about. . "And when you smile for the camera, I know they're gonna love you"
Thanks for doing this one Doug. Ahhhh............ my first year of high school. The memories come flooding back every time I listen to Aja. And the title track........... I play that when I'm feeling melancholy and moody. Haha. PLEASE react to more 'Dan. Try Pretzel Logic. It's incredible too !!
The groove in "Home at Last" is called a Purdie Shuffle, named for none other than the man himself. There's great video of him explaining how he does it. It's deceptively complex.
Becker and Fagen obviously felt otherwise, but "HAL" just SCREAMS "end-of-the-album track", for me.
Home At Last is about Homer’s Odyssey, when he ties himself to the mast to avoid the “danger on the rocks” (sirens).
I Got the News is one of my favorite SD deep tracks...not that nearly every SD song isn't a favorite deep track! There's a LOT going on. So many pieces fitting together.
Probably the best recorded pop album ever. The boys' ultra-meticulous nature sure paid off.... Just an amazing recording.
I bought this on its release and it stayed on my turntable forever!
One of the best albums ever. Got me into jazz.
Not buying the jilted lover/photo shoot explanation. Alternate theory: Aunt Peg was a prominent porn star in that era. He gets a reply from Peg in response to a fan letter with a cheap blueprint blue photo (think mimeographed), "foreign movie" was old-timey code for a racy/porn movie. Regardless a great track and album.
"It's your favorite foreign movie."
Donald and Walter were such perfectionists but the end results were incredible. However they did sometimes upset the session musicians; Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits travelled to the US to play on Third World Man on Gaucho and they only used 15 seconds of his quite a bit longer solo!
Just didn't realize how good we had it back then, with so much great music coming out on the regular.
It's literally a "perfect" album. Is there an album that beats it in terms of lyrics, musicianship and production?
This is a fantastic album. A favorite of mine. You can hear where Snarky Puppy gets some of their inspiration from.
Doug, you're absolutely right. "They write just as good as.they play!"
They do indeed
Thanks for the great review, and listening as we all did.back in the day, a side at a time.
"Home At Last" is my jam... a very close second behind the title track. Just can't beat the AWESOME drumming in "Aja!"... but, really everything about "Aja"... such a masterpiece!!! The synth instrument that caught your ear in this tune is called a Lyricon played by Tom Scott... this is known not because I have a great ear or I'm a musician, I found this out from "Professor of Rock" TH-cam channel.
How have you never heard "Josie?" About as funky as it gets! Anyway, as a Senior in High School in 1980, if you didn't know SD, you didn't know sh*t. I was totally into heavy stuff back then but, they were in your face during the 70's and were, and still, are spectacular. Song writing, recording and producing at its' best. I get complete control of the music at my job and play their complete catalog at least once a week. They're just that good and it never gets old!
Doug, I would say that Boz Scaggs "Silk Degrees" is a similar album from one year before. You need to check that out. A similar blend of jazz/pop/rock
May I suggest diving into the NY Rock & Soul Revue - Donald Fagen with some astonishing cohorts... Phoebe Snow, Michael McDonald, Eddie Brigati, Boz Scaggs... Holy Cow, to have been there in that theater for the recording. And fer pity sake, DO "GAUCHO"!
Kinda odd & ironic that SD would open for the Eagles since Henley & Co. **dissed** them in the lyrics of "Hotel California"!! 😳
Peg and Josie were both pretty big hits, but my personal favorite here is I Got the News, though I’m pretty sure I’m in the minority, LOL. Yeah, you can’t say enough good things about this album or band.
Yeah, those backing vocals and vocal harmonies are ALL Michael McDonald. He explains in a video somewhere on the TH-camS that the chord tones were so close together he'd lose track of which note he was supposed to be singing. All laid down in analog on tape with no Pro Tools,
I think "Peg" could've been a chart-topper, if they'd just given it a more obvious name. I loved this song from the start, but it was more than a year before I realized what it was called. 🧐
Listen and react to ToTo IV. It won six Grammys back in the day, best album and best song are two of the Grammys. A solid album where all of the songs have been played live. There is still no ToTo on the channel 😢
~20:03 It's Clydie King on backing vocals. Not "Kind". 😊
Check out Donald Fagan’s Kamakiriad album. He is such a talent.
Aja was the first album ever to cost $1M to record. S.Dan spent most of the money on multiple session players!
Great stuff Doug. Listen to Steely Dan albums, From Can't Buy A Thrill to Gaucho to the early 2000's. You won't be disappointed. Also, Donald's first solo album 'The Nightfly' from 1982 is just freaking great. Nice reaction to a special band. Later..
Well said… just listening to Steely Dan makes you feel a quite sophisticated cat. People know you have class and taste. Just as real back in the days, as is true today….🤘🏼😎
Steely Dan! Your favorite bands favorite band 🔥🤘✌
Some of the finest music ever produced, B&F are and were musicsl geniuses. Walter RIP.
In that instrumental break on Josie Jim Keltner is playing a metal garbage can lid!
'Home at Last' is pure lyrical genius (as are many, many of their lyrics). Multiple meanings shielded by a 'Homer' hip-fake. Thanks, Doug!
Peg was my next door neighbor in 1977. I was 17 and she was 20. Wouldn't give me the time of day. Then I left home and later on found out that she had a thing for cops. But there will always be the song!
Don't forget to give us a rating on Peg for danceability Doug! 😂
Bernard Purdie calls it the "Purdie Shuffle".
I heard a rumour that Rona Barrett was the "Broadway Duchess" in "I got the News".
GESTALT IS A GOOD SUMMATION OF HOW TIGHTLY KNIT THESE MUSICIANS MELDED TOGETHER TO MAKE SUCH EPIC MUSIC.
Peg and Josie were both radio hits. I'd be surprised if you'd never heard either one. Amazing chord progressions and solos.
I got the News is just unusual and lively and jazzy as hell
This was the first album of theirs i owned… on cassette… and i played it until it wouldn’t play anymore. As the age of CD’s dawned, i got the “Citizen Steely Dan” box set… and started acquiring Donald Fagen CD’s
My dad is huge Steely fan and I used to hate them when I was younger. But some time in high school I started to understand the Dan. No one like them.
There's a two part TH-cam video on the making of "Peg". This song is so much more complex than just a pop/blues song.
Great to enjoy this great music and your reaction on a Friday. This is one of those albums that winds up on all our mythical 'top 10' lists that actually have more than 10 albums.
Thanks Doug this was awesome.....this is a masterpiece, for me Donald Fagen is one of the greatest musical arrangers of our time....I know Walter Becker played a part in this too but Donald was the main arranger.....the choice & placement of the instrumentation is sublime as you pointed out....I would love for you to cover more from Steely Dan as I know you would appreciate its quality....
The instrument you didn't recognize was the Lyricon, played by Tom Scott. Also, the rhythm played by Bernard Purdie on drums is called "The Purdie Shuffle", as a bonus fact :)
Michael talks about how difficult it was for him to harmonize with himself because of how close each track was in terms of key.
more specifically, the note intervals in the vocal harmony parts. Oftentimes half-step b/c of the extended chords. So he probably had to record each voiceover individually WITHOUT listening to what he'd previously done.
The B side of this album is my favorite, especially Peg and I Got the News.
The mystery solo instrument on “Home at Last” is a lyricon, which is basically a saxophone based MIDI controller. Remember, this was when they were first starting to try and connect MIDI to everything.
I though it was a melodica.
I have been a Steely Dan fan for a long time and, in my opinion, this is their greatest album. It is one of those perfect albums that doesn't have a bad song on it. I am not a musician but simply enjoy this as a listener. I am pleased that Doug, who is an accomplished musician, has such great appreciation for it. It validates my feeling that this album, and others by Dan, are something special.
You should review “The Making of Aja”. They interview some of the musicians that played on the album as well as Donald and Walter and Roger, the engineer. It’s really a good video!
I've watched the "Classic Albums" documentary dvd on Aja many times. I always seem to see/hear something new that I must have passed over before! LOL
One of the greatest albums in the history of history!
That was great. Love that you covered the whole album. There may be a few who rival Steely Dan's sophistication, but no one surpasses them. Always top tier musicianship. Always.
It's Always a Dan Fine Day ... One theme running through most of the work is Michael McDonald...
How I wish I could listen to this album again for the first time. On the other hand it takes many many listens to fully appreciate it.