One of the reasons they open up the show with that song most of the time is so they could stretch out and play. Making their first song of the night more of an extended sound check.
Normies: “Reelin in the Years is my favorite Steely Dan song” “Intellectuals:” “I like deep cuts like deacon blues.” Gentleman Losers: “Turn that heartbeat over again is the best Steely Dan song.”
29:50 You edited out the part that second yelp was responding to - it was Jeff Porcaro’s outrageous drum fill in between the two halves of Denny Dias’s solo.
You rightfully heaped praise on the Skunk Baxter guitar solos on many of the early Dan albums, yet you didn't even mention what may be the best guitar solo in the history of popular music, which is Larry Carlton playing on Kid Charlemagne. It's ponderous.
Actually Donald Fagen has said he talked with Walter Becker about making another Steely Dan album after Everything Must Go but Walter just wasn't interested as he was suffering from his health problems so much
Yes, Becker's health was a major factor in the lack of another SD album. Becker had also lost patience with Fagen's fastidiousness. Everything Must Go was more organic compared with Two Against Nature, but Becker preferred more live tracking. Circus Money more organic still. Ever Fagen loosened up on Morph the Cat and especially Sunken Condos, opting for a more rapid recording and overdub process.
SD is one of my all time favorite bands. I have all their albums (lol dating myself there). But, yeah, been following their career & listening to their music since the 70's. Their music is the soundtrack to my life. I really enjoyed this video & your presentation. I was amazed with some of the things you discussed that I didn't know. I thought I basically knew everything about them. It was fun hearing factoids that I didn't know before. Great video, thanks! Looking forward to part 2 💙
@@varsityathlete9927 "Plenty of young people have their albums." Like, 100 or so?" P.S. They never split up. They simply stopped touring and didn't put out an album for 17 years. When they did decide to tour again, they had three albums (and much more) of material already recorded.
@@harddonuts4488 eh. a 100 of so? what you on dude. i can never get enough steely dan in stock. esp the last two. constantly out of stock. i see who is paying for them too. base your opinion on whatever I guess, I sell this stuff physically. We have currently zero dan records in stock, as usual. in fact often young people are more inventive in what they buy, as they are not stuck with notions of what music they like and don't like. for a young person its an endless ocean of new things. older people, very often stuck in their mindset of what they like and don't like. idea that young people don't like dan is completely wrong.
19:10, "And of course, Peg's infamous seven guitar solos" The funny thing about this part of the Classic Albums programme is, Fagen is sitting ripping this mystery soloist while Becker sits and says very little, and I strongly suspect this is because the soloist IS Becker; Brian Sweet's book says that "Becker himself tried the solo twice", and if Becker was the last guy to try it before Jay Graydon came in, which seems likely (as Becker was known for preferring other musicians before himself) I doubt they'd have wiped those from the multitrack tape. Also, I doubt they'd have let any player come in to record the solo, and print the envelope filter on the guitar right on to the multitrack for all time (they didn't do that for East St.Louis Toodle-Oo, or the talkbox guitar on Haitian Divorce; both effects were applied once the guitar part had been recorded) Lastly, the phrasing of both solos sounds very similar to me, and very similar to the style and phrasing of Walter Becker's playing. I also think that Rick Marotta is just entering into the B/F sense of humour on the TOOM tracking date, you can tell the way he changes the accent on the "take a fuckin' bite" comment. And, he ended up the drummer on the album, so he must have carried on tracking drums after that. You can hear Gary Katz laughing after Rick says "go fuck yourself".
There is also the story of Rick Derringer. He came in and recorded the solo. They thanked him and told him he was great. Right after he left, Walter turned to the engineer and said "Erase it".
There is no band that remotely compares to the sophistication of Fagen & Beckers compositions. They produce a musical product up there with Duke Ellington or Weather Report or any of Miles Davis's groups from the mid 1950's on.
Another lifelong SD fan chiming in here. I did know a lot of this, do have some of the obscure releases you covered here. But you did get some newer stuff in there that was new to me. Kuddos on that, on to part two.
Ah good, I'm glad I searched for this on the YT. Been listening to Steely Dan and Fangen's Music since 2013 and a bunch of the underground stuff I've not been aware of, shit really makes me want to dig a bit deeper. Thanks a bundle person on the internet for making this lengthy and passionate video.
Next to possibly only Kid Charlemagne and Deacon Blues, it’s my favorite thing they’ve ever done. That smooth but really out-there chord progression is something else. That’s all not even to mention that amazing groove.
I applaud your work here. VERY WELL done. One minor nit (Please don't let it detract from the praise you rightly deserve for your impressive efforts): Since September 3, 2017 - it is just not possible for there to be "a new Steely Dan record".
1st - As far as lyrics, delivery, sophistication, melody, mastering and instrumentation go, Steely Dan reigns supreme. 2nd- Fagen had 4 solo albums, he forgot to name Sunken Condo from 2012. 3rd- this is a beautiful overview, thank you.
Dude Dingus that was AWESOME! Old schooler Michael T Wyman here. In LA./Del Rey California. Guitarist and Dan Fan. Saw Steely Dan at L.A. Forum around 2017 with Doobie Brothers. Great gig! Got a T-shirt. Wear it proudly.
We now know that the masters did not burn in the Universal fire, thank god!-It does seem the master tapes for Aja and Gaucho are missing though (judging by what Chad Kassem and co. say) which is hard to believe in a sense.
I got way too excited when I saw the title to this video!!!! I haven't watched it yet and already liked and subscribed..lol. a Yes iceberg... and a Rush iceberg would be cool! See what I did there?
I love Sunken Condos - Great album Slinky thing 1st track - We visit the mature guy & the younger lady yet gain in this amazing song ! -It has a wonderfu l Amp Fiddler feel to it ? - Donalds lyrics mentions they stroll down by the REPTILE CAGE - His humour shining through as uusual ! haha ! - in his song ! - I just love it ! The whole album is full of these wiitty gems !
It's a pity that a number of people seem only to be looking for something (anything!) you might have gotten wrong. I'd just like to say thank you for such an interesting video on the best band ever. The work that goes into such a video is hard to understand, and it's free for everyone to enjoy! Nice one, man. 👍
Donald's creative talents went down a few notches after he received psychotherapy in the 80's, it makes you wonder if his talent was the fruit of some psychological complex.
Fagen's leaned more R&B and percussive for Kamakiriad after an aborted 2nd solo album and SD album in the 80s, but the tune were more melodic on Everything Must Go, Morph the Cat and Sunken Condos. Having said that 80s penned songs like Century's End, Big Noise New York are classics, not too mention Lazy Nina (Greg Philliganes) and Diana Ross' Love Will Make it Right. A few of the SD and Kamakiriad were left overs from 80s attempts. So think of an mid 80s Fagen solo album with Big Noise New York, Snowbound, Lazy Nina, Century's End, On the Dunes, Confide in Me, Love Will Make it Right, West of Hollywood. That's a damn good album. I'd argue that his STYLE of songwriting changed, with complex rhythms and more complex chords and harmonies...with more melodic song structure returning from Two Against NAture to Sunken Condos. JMO.
Most songwriters not named Irving Berlin or Paul McCartney have a relatively limited number of years where they are really on fire. The well also dried up for Jimmy Page, Burt Bacharach, Carole King, Brian Wilson, Stevie Wonder, and many other giants of Fagen's era. Some of them kept releasing albums full of mediocre songs, and some basically retired from songwriting.
Platinum Gaucho mic on a floppy disc? You couldn’t fit any real digital mix on a floppy. They were a couple of megabytes at best and this was long before Mp3 compression.
High fidelity with the exception of Katy Lied, the recording of which suffered from a major equipment malfunction. Just a very brief mention of Roger Nicholls in the video, and nothing about how he was an integral part of the SD sound. How he invented Wendel and how he acquired the 'Immortal' nickname. Mark Knopfler's experience playing on 'Time Out Of Mind'? Just a few suggestions for Part 2. Anyway, an enjoyable video and I hadn't heard quite a few of those unreleased tracks before.
Hi. What version of the Second Arrangement did you play in the outro?? Sounds like John Paddicks version he played on Totally Wired Radio at 1:58:16. Possible friend of your uncles? ;)
Man, I would LOVE to hear all these outtakes! Huge Dan fan, but didn't know that stuff really existed.. Is there anywhere where all this material is consolidated?
I had an LP in my collection for years, that ended up selling in a garage sale. It was supposedly Donald & Walter in early years before Steely Dan. Not a very good recording and nothing like their official releases, I let it go in the sale. The album was called “Walk it Like You Talk it, or Loose That Beat” (or close to that) Have you heard of this one?
On a related note, the NYC musician Anthony Robustelli took a batch of "pre-Dan" songs from their songwriters-for-hire phase (plus "The Second Arrangement") and made an attempt to arrange and perform them in a sort of late 1970s Steely Dan way. An homage and a curiosity. Sort of halfway between a cover album and fan fiction. The record is called "The Steely Dan Sessions: Interpretations of Unrealized Classics". You can hear individual cuts on TH-cam.
I had a bootleg live recording of Steely Dan, pre-Pretzel. It was crude, with just a white cover and a piece of paper scotch-taped to it saying Steely Dan Live. One saving grace was it contained an instrumental that later became the beginning of the song "Your Gold Teeth II"
Love the SD 411 but the Schlitz commercial is NOT lost..we have a copy of it downloaded and its not only hilarious, its song ( jingle?) is a great song in the style of earlier SD.🎉 And JB is laugh out loud funny. The helium technique was genius! Im not sure who came up with that one but hats off to them.😂 Superb, sublime, 100% Dan😊
3:40 Gaucho sure has good sound quality. But some of the tunes on Aja sound worse than some of their tunes recorded in 1973. I'm talking about technical aspects like distortion and such here, as you mentioned HiFi equipment. The actual playing, arrangements and compositions is another thing entirely.
Huh?? 🤔 Well you must have a bunk copy then, or perhaps just a lousy stereo, because Aja is an audiophile recording through & through! Get yourself a 1st USA pressing, either of the vinyl or the CD. They both sound incredible!
@@R3TR0R4V3 Haha! I hear the same distortion and uneven sound quality from the Aja LP even on TH-cam. And, again, not as much on other SD records (whether LPs, CDs or TH-cam), especially not the one recorded in 1973 iirc. My own collection of Steely Dan is CDs only, but I had them on tape from my friend's LPs before that with exactly the same uneven sound quality, between LPs as well as between different tunes. Donald Fagan has addressed this issue too, btw.
@@herrbonk3635 Interesting! Since you have a CD, I guess that rules out inner groove distortion. Some of the horns were mixed kind of hot (Home At Last solo, etc) but I always thought it was kind of normal. Anyways, I'll have to look in to this more.. Color me intrigued! Cheers
Great video. ... I only did one pass through but I'll be back, so much to take in. ... I enjoyed the Rick Marotta quote, "I jerk off enough at home". ... It would be nice to be a fly on the wall when, after 20-takes, Donald asks for more. ... When Donald asked Rick, 'through someone else', you can hear in his voice he's walking on thin ice and might need an escort to his car. ... We've all read the stories of Phil woods and Wayne Shorter walking in and nailing the first pass, but the painstaking 20th take stories might be highly entertaining. ... We all know Skunk was pissed when he left and Denny stayed in touch with the boys but those tales may be interesting? ... There was many tooth's pulled on the Dan recordings. ... Walter's bass playing up to the time he passed it on to Chuck is really amazing and I've read Walter's guitar solos always pleased Donald but Walter wasn't content with his earlier solos and passed them off. ... Plus you don't mention The Nightfly album which I heard really took a toll on Donald. He's said he's never listened to the album since. ... Thanks.
Good video! Just two things: First, the way you say Becker "killed his girlfriend" (leaving it up to the viewer to read the screenshot for clarifying details) makes it sound like he murdered her, which is a bit much! Second: thanks for clarifying the pronunciation of Denny Dias' family name! I'd been saying it the Spanish way for the past twenty years...
@@ceddyharris6340 Well, that is confusing. Seems to me that it's got to be a Spanish or Portuguese name, but I guess Denny didn't feel the need to pronounce it that way.
@@mrgeorgejetson Fagen is an odd duck so it's hard to tell. The only reason this stands out to me is because I was just listening to a recent interview with Paul Shaffer and he definitely said "Dee-az." But I'm pretty sure I've heard him say "Dy-as" as well. I also noticed that Fagen has developed a hard lisp, which I've never noticed before.
@@ceddyharris6340 Well, like I said it's almost certainly a Spanish name, in which case it would be pronounced "DEE" not "DIE," as Shaffer does, probably from having encountered it before. But I guess it doesn't really matter, and I'm a bit hung up on correct name pronunciation since all of my life people have been pronouncing my own family name incorrectly--and yes, that includes Rosie Perez and Perez Hilton, both of whom know damn well how the name is supposed to be pronounced but have clearly just figured that constantly correcting people makes one seem a bit crazy. The emphasis should be on the first syllable, in case anybody cares: "PE-res," not "puh-REZ." Alas, the cross I bear! Hahaha
Becker & Fagan originally wanted Howard Kaylan (The Turtles, Zappa & The Mothers, Flo & Eddie...) to join as vocalist, prior to David Palmer. Kaylan would only join with his performing partner in all things harmonic, Mark Volman. Becker & Fagan only wanted Kaylan, Kaylan wouldn't part with Volman, so it went flat. However, Flo & Eddie (Volman & Kaylan) did a demo with The Dan in, "Everyone's Gone to The Movies".... This info comes from Kaylan's autobiography- Shell Shocked. 🚬😎
Since you asked, only your assertion that the Dan's sound was achieved with the exclusion of Reverb. Where appropriate this is one of the few treatments that they would in fact use, I can think of some use of Vibrato also, and of course Distortion. What you maybe meant to say was they excluded EQ treatment, instead employing the dark arts of Roger Nicholls to work the studio like an instrument, getting the sounds they wanted without post processing. Liked, Subbed, yadda yadda.
Really, there’s so much to it. The absolute best spaces and equipment, the best ears in the game, two perfectionists with studio time budgets to spend, great arrangements and performances that don’t need much, pristine mic placement, and as often doesn’t get mentioned - a visionary sense of what it *should* sound like. People like to imagine some perfect piece of gear or process, but really I suspect it comes down to skill, time, vision, and perseverance.
"Becker and Fagen destroyed the Second Arrangement on purpose."
Your videos just lost all credibility
Thanks Pete Fogel
Thank you Pete Fogel
Why are you so humorless, Fogel? Maybe smoking too much weed, or not enough?
Thanks Peter Foggle
Thank you pete fogel
I can tell you why they kept going on Green Earrings for 7 minutes. They were having fun and just wanted to keep jamming. Happens all the time.
The song is an absolute jam
One of the reasons they open up the show with that song most of the time is so they could stretch out and play. Making their first song of the night more of an extended sound check.
Call that the Grateful Dan
Seven minutes? I don’t mind. I don’t mind.
Normies: “Reelin in the Years is my favorite Steely Dan song”
“Intellectuals:” “I like deep cuts like deacon blues.”
Gentleman Losers: “Turn that heartbeat over again is the best Steely Dan song.”
And TRUE intellectuals find their cup of tea in Do It Again
@@BoxingFanaticNumero1 it's such an amazing song, no matter how much i listen to it, I still find myself coming back to it the most.
@@TheTurkishKebabExperience it is literally the same for me 🤝
hrrrnngg Don't take me alive hits different
“You done it, you done hired the hit maker” is one of my favorite steely dan moments
the Purdy shuffle
29:50 You edited out the part that second yelp was responding to - it was Jeff Porcaro’s outrageous drum fill in between the two halves of Denny Dias’s solo.
donald singing deja vu gets me everytime
You rightfully heaped praise on the Skunk Baxter guitar solos on many of the early Dan albums, yet you didn't even mention what may be the best guitar solo in the history of popular music, which is Larry Carlton playing on Kid Charlemagne. It's ponderous.
Ponderous man, f*ckin ponderous.
yeah, kanye thought so too.
He mentioned Larry Carlton. Maybe you missed it.
Actually Donald Fagen has said he talked with Walter Becker about making another Steely Dan album after Everything Must Go but Walter just wasn't interested as he was suffering from his health problems so much
Thanks for the correction. I'll be sure to mention it in part 2.
Was about to say this
Yes, Becker's health was a major factor in the lack of another SD album. Becker had also lost patience with Fagen's fastidiousness. Everything Must Go was more organic compared with Two Against Nature, but Becker preferred more live tracking. Circus Money more organic still. Ever Fagen loosened up on Morph the Cat and especially Sunken Condos, opting for a more rapid recording and overdub process.
@@MrEvan-xw6nn Thumbs up for the avatar name. Very cool reference perfectly in keeping w/ this topic.
I'm a committed SD freak and musician. From my perspective, this video covers quite a bit of ground and is just about 100% on point. Nice work.
SD is one of my all time favorite bands. I have all their albums (lol dating myself there). But, yeah, been following their career & listening to their music since the 70's. Their music is the soundtrack to my life. I really enjoyed this video & your presentation. I was amazed with some of the things you discussed that I didn't know. I thought I basically knew everything about them. It was fun hearing factoids that I didn't know before. Great video, thanks! Looking forward to part 2 💙
having all their albums doesn't date you. plenty of young people have the albums too, who were born after they originally split
If you’re dating yourself then I’m rating you as A+ aged to perfection and only getting sweeter with time tea girl.
So, do you believe everything this artard said here? He read it in rolling stone magazing so, it must be true.
@@varsityathlete9927 "Plenty of young people have their albums." Like, 100 or so?"
P.S. They never split up. They simply stopped touring and didn't put out an album for 17 years. When they did decide to tour again, they had three albums (and much more) of material already recorded.
@@harddonuts4488 eh. a 100 of so? what you on dude. i can never get enough steely dan in stock. esp the last two. constantly out of stock. i see who is paying for them too.
base your opinion on whatever I guess, I sell this stuff physically.
We have currently zero dan records in stock, as usual. in fact often young people are more inventive in what they buy, as they are not stuck with notions of what music they like and don't like. for a young person its an endless ocean of new things. older people, very often stuck in their mindset of what they like and don't like.
idea that young people don't like dan is completely wrong.
19:10, "And of course, Peg's infamous seven guitar solos"
The funny thing about this part of the Classic Albums programme is, Fagen is sitting ripping this mystery soloist while Becker sits and says very little, and I strongly suspect this is because the soloist IS Becker; Brian Sweet's book says that "Becker himself tried the solo twice", and if Becker was the last guy to try it before Jay Graydon came in, which seems likely (as Becker was known for preferring other musicians before himself) I doubt they'd have wiped those from the multitrack tape.
Also, I doubt they'd have let any player come in to record the solo, and print the envelope filter on the guitar right on to the multitrack for all time (they didn't do that for East St.Louis Toodle-Oo, or the talkbox guitar on Haitian Divorce; both effects were applied once the guitar part had been recorded)
Lastly, the phrasing of both solos sounds very similar to me, and very similar to the style and phrasing of Walter Becker's playing.
I also think that Rick Marotta is just entering into the B/F sense of humour on the TOOM tracking date, you can tell the way he changes the accent on the "take a fuckin' bite" comment. And, he ended up the drummer on the album, so he must have carried on tracking drums after that. You can hear Gary Katz laughing after Rick says "go fuck yourself".
There is also the story of Rick Derringer. He came in and recorded the solo. They thanked him and told him he was great. Right after he left, Walter turned to the engineer and said "Erase it".
Cringe worthy award ceremony scene? Don’t underestimate Walters sense of humor, he just trolled you man.
That was pretty funny, wonder if they had discussed it prior
He is simply a cringemaker 😎
@@windsurfer_LA Yep, no doubt trying to bang them on a freebie :)
@@windsurfer_LA did you see how quickly his eyes started blinking when she says "..are you reelin in the sheaves"
Wasn't Chevy Chase Steely's original drummer when they where Leather Canary?
YES. They all attended Bard College in Annandale-on hudson, NY
There is no band that remotely compares to the sophistication of Fagen & Beckers compositions. They produce a musical
product up there with Duke Ellington or Weather Report or any of Miles Davis's groups from the mid 1950's on.
A cut above weather report
Another lifelong SD fan chiming in here. I did know a lot of this, do have some of the obscure releases you covered here. But you did get some newer stuff in there that was new to me. Kuddos on that, on to part two.
You don’t even know happy I am that you made this video, I absolutely love Steely Dan
Enjoyed the video - nice job and there's always more info to learn about the Dan. I don't know what the music world would be without them.
Ah good, I'm glad I searched for this on the YT. Been listening to Steely Dan and Fangen's Music since 2013 and a bunch of the underground stuff I've not been aware of, shit really makes me want to dig a bit deeper. Thanks a bundle person on the internet for making this lengthy and passionate video.
1:57 Thanks for the namecheck!
Steely Dan is one of the greatest groups of all time! I'm amazed there's an iceberg.
6:56 That's Desperate Dan (from the UK comic book the Dandy) in the poster. Never seen that one before.
Kulee Baba would have been the best song on Gaucho.
Next to possibly only Kid Charlemagne and Deacon Blues, it’s my favorite thing they’ve ever done. That smooth but really out-there chord progression is something else. That’s all not even to mention that amazing groove.
For sure, incredible song
A thousand times yes
I remember i copied a cd of Gaucho on a Sony metal casette tape once and was amazed bij the clarity of the sound.
Great deep dive! Learned a bunch about one of my favorite bands 👍 Favorite song? Home at Last! 😊
I think the reason why Kulee Baba was scrapped is that it plagiarizes a weather report song and they feared a lawsuit
Which song ?
@@franciscocontreras2139 compare the outtake with Teen Town by Weather Report
Only the song’s intro. Hardly seems like enough but who knows
I applaud your work here.
VERY WELL done.
One minor nit (Please don't let it detract from the praise you rightly deserve for your impressive efforts):
Since September 3, 2017 - it is just not possible for there to be "a new Steely Dan record".
And yet there has been.
@@dangrahamdrums - Live albums don’t count. It’s obvious bugsunplugged was referring to a new studio album.
@@crusheverything4449 so obvious. Thanks
NP
This is a brilliant documentary piece! I love this music and just discovered so much more to listen to. Excellent.
A iceberg based on one of my favorite bands of all time! Awesome
1st - As far as lyrics, delivery, sophistication, melody, mastering and instrumentation go, Steely Dan reigns supreme. 2nd- Fagen had 4 solo albums, he forgot to name Sunken Condo from 2012. 3rd- this is a beautiful overview, thank you.
Where's reeling in the sheeves?
Dude Dingus that was AWESOME! Old schooler Michael T Wyman here. In LA./Del Rey California. Guitarist and Dan Fan.
Saw Steely Dan at L.A. Forum around 2017 with Doobie Brothers. Great gig! Got a T-shirt. Wear it proudly.
You have no idea how happy you have made me!
Nightfly is a great album. Awesome
We now know that the masters did not burn in the Universal fire, thank god!-It does seem the master tapes for Aja and Gaucho are missing though (judging by what Chad Kassem and co. say) which is hard to believe in a sense.
Really great video! I’m a huge fan of Steely Dan so it’s amazing to hear more about them.
Great content, however I think Becker, and Fagan would both agree you need to adjust your sound and turn that mic up:)
I always enjoy scuba diving, especially around icebergs. Looking from below is like a prism effect you can get no other way.
I got way too excited when I saw the title to this video!!!! I haven't watched it yet and already liked and subscribed..lol. a Yes iceberg... and a Rush iceberg would be cool!
See what I did there?
That "Happy Dance" is probably a reenactment from Woody Allen's "Sleepers"
I love Sunken Condos - Great album
Slinky thing 1st track - We visit the mature guy & the younger lady yet gain in this amazing song ! -It has a wonderfu l Amp Fiddler feel to it ? - Donalds lyrics mentions they stroll down by the REPTILE CAGE - His humour shining through as uusual ! haha ! - in his song ! - I just love it !
The whole album is full of these wiitty gems !
Creepin at a reptiles pace…. 😅 hold on to that slinky thing…. Love those lyrics
awesome man looking forward to PT II
I'm on the back cover of "Alive in America".. I guess you saved that tidbit for part 2.
I honestly couldn't believe you could make on steely dan, Great job!
A Steely Dan will melt any Iceberg to a Smile 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
Thanks for making this, I love some good TH-cam steely Dan content
Great video. Thanks for all your work. Well done.
$600 reward for those two tracks?? That's pretty cheap even for 1999. Hmmm
I'm 67YRS old and I appreciate Steely Dan it was a 8 track can't buy a cheap thrill
"Deacon Blues/Peg" "There really isn't that much to say here so..."
Okay, you're losing me.
@Jason Bishop (Same like a few seconds later)
It's a pity that a number of people seem only to be looking for something (anything!) you might have gotten wrong.
I'd just like to say thank you for such an interesting video on the best band ever.
The work that goes into such a video is hard to understand, and it's free for everyone to enjoy!
Nice one, man. 👍
Another thing to talk about is the quadraphonic take of Reeling in the Years had another guitar part added in
Donald's creative talents went down a few notches after he received psychotherapy in the 80's, it makes you wonder if his talent was the fruit of some psychological complex.
Fagen's leaned more R&B and percussive for Kamakiriad after an aborted 2nd solo album and SD album in the 80s, but the tune were more melodic on Everything Must Go, Morph the Cat and Sunken Condos. Having said that 80s penned songs like Century's End, Big Noise New York are classics, not too mention Lazy Nina (Greg Philliganes) and Diana Ross' Love Will Make it Right. A few of the SD and Kamakiriad were left overs from 80s attempts. So think of an mid 80s Fagen solo album with Big Noise New York, Snowbound, Lazy Nina, Century's End, On the Dunes, Confide in Me, Love Will Make it Right, West of Hollywood. That's a damn good album.
I'd argue that his STYLE of songwriting changed, with complex rhythms and more complex chords and harmonies...with more melodic song structure returning from Two Against NAture to Sunken Condos. JMO.
Most songwriters not named Irving Berlin or Paul McCartney have a relatively limited number of years where they are really on fire. The well also dried up for Jimmy Page, Burt Bacharach, Carole King, Brian Wilson, Stevie Wonder, and many other giants of Fagen's era. Some of them kept releasing albums full of mediocre songs, and some basically retired from songwriting.
This explains why Two Against Nature and Everything Must Go sucked.
Platinum Gaucho mic on a floppy disc? You couldn’t fit any real digital mix on a floppy. They were a couple of megabytes at best and this was long before Mp3 compression.
did not expect this at all
quality asf tho, waiting for part two 👍👍
Dude this is just great work Thanks for this channel loved it!
a dan geek must see howard wright's steely dan tab page. VERY accurate.
Sunken Condos is a great album! Everyone should listen to it.
Obscurity is genius. Love what you did here.
What year did by accident become on accident?
High fidelity with the exception of Katy Lied, the recording of which suffered from a major equipment malfunction. Just a very brief mention of Roger Nicholls in the video, and nothing about how he was an integral part of the SD sound. How he invented Wendel and how he acquired the 'Immortal' nickname. Mark Knopfler's experience playing on 'Time Out Of Mind'? Just a few suggestions for Part 2. Anyway, an enjoyable video and I hadn't heard quite a few of those unreleased tracks before.
Thought I knew a fair bit about SD but learned a lot of quirky facts from this production.
I also love sunken Condos with my favorite song being Miss Marlene, it’s sooooo smooth
Good stuff. There is a line about Steely Dan in one of the Buddy Rich Tapes from what I remember.
Hey, do you have the script for this iceberg? If so, I want to take a look at it
Thanks so much, that was terrific, very informative, I am now going to dig deeper
Hi. What version of the Second Arrangement did you play in the outro?? Sounds like John Paddicks version he played on Totally Wired Radio at 1:58:16. Possible friend of your uncles? ;)
It is the one from Paddick's worktape, specifically this leak. th-cam.com/video/q8bfpy40sfI/w-d-xo.html
How did I miss this a month ago? YT really be shitting on me. 😔
Great video. Really enjoyed this!
Man, I would LOVE to hear all these outtakes! Huge Dan fan, but didn't know that stuff really existed.. Is there anywhere where all this material is consolidated?
On the hard drives in my safe 😆
I had an LP in my collection for years, that ended up selling in a garage sale. It was supposedly Donald & Walter in early years before Steely Dan. Not a very good recording and nothing like their official releases, I let it go in the sale. The album was called “Walk it Like You Talk it, or Loose That Beat” (or close to that) Have you heard of this one?
Yes, I've heard of it. It's a soundtrack that they did for a lost 1971 movie of the same name, and I talk a bit about it in the second part.
On a related note, the NYC musician Anthony Robustelli took a batch of "pre-Dan" songs from their songwriters-for-hire phase (plus "The Second Arrangement") and made an attempt to arrange and perform them in a sort of late 1970s Steely Dan way. An homage and a curiosity. Sort of halfway between a cover album and fan fiction. The record is called "The Steely Dan Sessions: Interpretations of Unrealized Classics". You can hear individual cuts on TH-cam.
Your seem to be well informed upon Steely Dan , does any other collection of music interest you , dig up the 70’s band CityBoy I’d like know more lll
Excellent research and video
Ever bear SDs cover of hesitation blues? It’s great
I had a bootleg live recording of Steely Dan, pre-Pretzel. It was crude, with just a white cover and a piece of paper scotch-taped to it saying Steely Dan Live. One saving grace was it contained an instrumental that later became the beginning of the song "Your Gold Teeth II"
Was it the Record Plant 74 show? That was the first Dan bootleg to my knowledge.
Love the SD 411 but the Schlitz commercial is NOT lost..we have a copy of it downloaded and its not only hilarious, its song ( jingle?) is a great song in the style of earlier SD.🎉 And JB is laugh out loud funny. The helium technique was genius! Im not sure who came up with that one but hats off to them.😂 Superb, sublime, 100% Dan😊
Major SD fan. Stuff here I didn’t know about. Kudos Sir!
3:40 Gaucho sure has good sound quality. But some of the tunes on Aja sound worse than some of their tunes recorded in 1973. I'm talking about technical aspects like distortion and such here, as you mentioned HiFi equipment. The actual playing, arrangements and compositions is another thing entirely.
Huh?? 🤔 Well you must have a bunk copy then, or perhaps just a lousy stereo, because Aja is an audiophile recording through & through! Get yourself a 1st USA pressing, either of the vinyl or the CD. They both sound incredible!
@@R3TR0R4V3 Haha! I hear the same distortion and uneven sound quality from the Aja LP even on TH-cam. And, again, not as much on other SD records (whether LPs, CDs or TH-cam), especially not the one recorded in 1973 iirc. My own collection of Steely Dan is CDs only, but I had them on tape from my friend's LPs before that with exactly the same uneven sound quality, between LPs as well as between different tunes. Donald Fagan has addressed this issue too, btw.
@@herrbonk3635 Interesting! Since you have a CD, I guess that rules out inner groove distortion. Some of the horns were mixed kind of hot (Home At Last solo, etc) but I always thought it was kind of normal. Anyways, I'll have to look in to this more.. Color me intrigued! Cheers
Vocal Fry Alert!
Great video. ... I only did one pass through but I'll be back, so much to take in. ... I enjoyed the Rick Marotta quote, "I jerk off enough at home". ... It would be nice to be a fly on the wall when, after 20-takes, Donald asks for more. ... When Donald asked Rick, 'through someone else', you can hear in his voice he's walking on thin ice and might need an escort to his car. ... We've all read the stories of Phil woods and Wayne Shorter walking in and nailing the first pass, but the painstaking 20th take stories might be highly entertaining. ... We all know Skunk was pissed when he left and Denny stayed in touch with the boys but those tales may be interesting? ... There was many tooth's pulled on the Dan recordings. ... Walter's bass playing up to the time he passed it on to Chuck is really amazing and I've read Walter's guitar solos always pleased Donald but Walter wasn't content with his earlier solos and passed them off. ... Plus you don't mention The Nightfly album which I heard really took a toll on Donald. He's said he's never listened to the album since. ... Thanks.
Thanks baby. Great job. 👍
Good video! Just two things:
First, the way you say Becker "killed his girlfriend" (leaving it up to the viewer to read the screenshot for clarifying details) makes it sound like he murdered her, which is a bit much!
Second: thanks for clarifying the pronunciation of Denny Dias' family name! I'd been saying it the Spanish way for the past twenty years...
Yeah I noticed that too regarding his girlfriend. She died from an overdose.
Fagen pronounces it the Spanish way in several interviews over the years, which has left me confused.
@@ceddyharris6340 Well, that is confusing. Seems to me that it's got to be a Spanish or Portuguese name, but I guess Denny didn't feel the need to pronounce it that way.
@@mrgeorgejetson Fagen is an odd duck so it's hard to tell. The only reason this stands out to me is because I was just listening to a recent interview with Paul Shaffer and he definitely said "Dee-az." But I'm pretty sure I've heard him say "Dy-as" as well. I also noticed that Fagen has developed a hard lisp, which I've never noticed before.
@@ceddyharris6340 Well, like I said it's almost certainly a Spanish name, in which case it would be pronounced "DEE" not "DIE," as Shaffer does, probably from having encountered it before.
But I guess it doesn't really matter, and I'm a bit hung up on correct name pronunciation since all of my life people have been pronouncing my own family name incorrectly--and yes, that includes Rosie Perez and Perez Hilton, both of whom know damn well how the name is supposed to be pronounced but have clearly just figured that constantly correcting people makes one seem a bit crazy. The emphasis should be on the first syllable, in case anybody cares: "PE-res," not "puh-REZ." Alas, the cross I bear! Hahaha
Stand by the Seawall v1, a nice Aja Outtake
These albums are so good its unreal
Liked for the clip of Walter Becker trying to shake Stevie Wonder's hand
Great video! I really love Steely Dan and it was cool to hear mr. Fagen saying the f word haha. Greetings from Brazil
these icebergs are getting REALLY specific to my liking now.
Banger Vidjo. I didn’t know very much about Steely Dan but now I am half-god
oh sweet jesus.
why am i finding this just now?
I thought I knew a considerable amount.
Not so.
Great wealth of interesting information here!!
Becker & Fagan originally wanted Howard Kaylan (The Turtles, Zappa & The Mothers, Flo & Eddie...)
to join as vocalist, prior to David Palmer.
Kaylan would only join with his performing partner in all things harmonic, Mark Volman.
Becker & Fagan only wanted Kaylan, Kaylan wouldn't part with Volman, so it went flat.
However, Flo & Eddie (Volman & Kaylan) did a demo with The Dan in, "Everyone's Gone to The Movies"....
This info comes from Kaylan's autobiography- Shell Shocked.
🚬😎
The song Good Stuff off of Sunken Condos is in my opinion Fagen's best song from his solo catalog.
FUCKING FINALLY STEELY DAN ON MY FEEED
like your style. I'm subscribing :-)
Can’t watch it yet, but did you include the one about Becker getting run over by the girls parents?
I need to hear all the tracks of your gold teeth ii, i totally don't have an addiction with that song
Since you asked, only your assertion that the Dan's sound was achieved with the exclusion of Reverb.
Where appropriate this is one of the few treatments that they would in fact use, I can think of some use of Vibrato also, and of course Distortion.
What you maybe meant to say was they excluded EQ treatment, instead employing the dark arts of Roger Nicholls to work the studio like an instrument, getting the sounds they wanted without post processing.
Liked, Subbed, yadda yadda.
Really, there’s so much to it. The absolute best spaces and equipment, the best ears in the game, two perfectionists with studio time budgets to spend, great arrangements and performances that don’t need much, pristine mic placement, and as often doesn’t get mentioned - a visionary sense of what it *should* sound like.
People like to imagine some perfect piece of gear or process, but really I suspect it comes down to skill, time, vision, and perseverance.
@@alexe8375 Reading your insights, alex, I wonder what the particular role of Gary Katz brought and how (I presume) it evolved during the decade.
@@alexe8375 - Absolutely spot on, man!
@Phil T - Maybe he said it on accident.
Everyone should check out the new David Crosby track “Rodriguez for a night” penned by Donald Fagen for his latest album
I believe the 'unintelligible' comment at 28:57 is "but it's sore!"
Steely Dan, America's Beatles.
Re: famous guest players….No mention of Mark Knopfler as guest on “Gaucho” - “Time Out of Mind”
its because there are probably 50 better guitar performances on there other tracks