Posted on 07/31/2020 12:55:36 PM PDT by Old Yeller
Good 70's tune.
IIRC, Skunk Baxter did the solo on Rikki and, as an aside, Walter Becker did the solo on “Pretzel Logic”.
The Pretzel Logic album was the first appearance of Jeff Porcaro on a Steely Dan album and played double drums with Jim Gordon on “Parker’s Band”.
Barrytown is one of my favorite Dan songs.
One of my all-time faves.
Also "A Hit By Varese".
Same here. I binged on his videos after discovering him a year or so ago.
‘I refuse to think of politics when that beautiful guitar line is ripping.”
Me too!
48 years since the song was released. 1972 was the year that Biden was first elected to the Senate. At least the song has given enjoyment to many people, whereas Biden has contributed absolutely nothing of value.
I just discovered Beato’s videos, I just watched this one about Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, I had never heard of this guy, but he’s probably the most amazing jazz bassist I’ve ever heard.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17qRY0XCuq0
I was just singing that the other day while working and chuckled at the words. I read Walter Becker chuckled when he’d read Fagan’s lyrics.
I have been on a SCTV kick lately and I watched that clip. I can’t listen to “Ride Like The Wind” without seeing that skit in my mind.
I read that, the first time Michael saw that skit, he was high from smoking some strong weed with “Skunk” Baxter and he was confused, lol.
The skit was so funny because the premise was so true.
IMO, SCTV aged much better than SNL. Their music parodies were the best, especially Mel’s Rock Pile.
Mel’s Rock Pile featured the best Punk Rock band ever:
The Queen Haters: “I Hate The Bloody Queen”
That guy is too much, especially his right hand.
I liked Beato’s story about listening to jazz records with his dad in the living room...”we’d listen to the A side and then I’d get up and flip it and we’d listen to the B side, and then maybe we’d talk about the record...or maybe we wouldn’t talk about it.”
Yes, that story hit home for me too, I got a bit blurry-eyed, I miss my Dad, he used to have a Reel-To-Reel where he let me load the tapes and we’d listen together.
Similar deal here. Used to listen to records with Dad in the den—mostly ‘70s era country because that was his thing. He’s still very much around but that story made me think about how much I’m going to miss him some day.
I never liked McDonald as a lead singer, especially hated the Doobies after he replaced Johnston.
But then I began to pick him out in some of the Steely Dan tacks. The precision of his pitch runs to extraordinary, especially in tracks like "Peg." Consistently. And that's not auto-tune, his pitch is that perfect.
I've long loved Steely Dan but never thought Fagan was much of a vocalist. Then in the last couple of years I managed to get bootlegs of live performances in the mid-70s. And I was amazed he was such a fine singer back then. They hired a vocalist for the live shows because Fagan's voice wouldn't hold up for a string of live performances but over the years he developed a stronger singing voice and was able to do all the live vocals himself. Unfortunately in developing that power and endurance he lost the delicacy he'd had before.
The best comment I've ever heard about Fagan's singing voice came from himself. He said imagine the improbability of a rock and roll band with a lead singer who sounded like Jerry Lewis.
I nearly fell over.
And yet I couldn’t imagine anyone singing SD songs other than Fagen, somehow he had the perfect voice for those lyrics.
True about McDonald. I just listened to Peg and he is spot on. I’m noticing he’s got his vibrato synced across multiple takes as well.
I’ve always liked Fagan’s distinctive voice.
I like that one. Also the vocorder on Hatian Divorce was pretty rad, too.
Jimi was, IIRC, a fan of that solo or Terry Kath or both.
Yes.
Michael McDonald has perfect pitch.
AS far as Donald Fagen’s voice, I’ve always thought he sounded like one of the engineers from the control booth who came out to do a sound check. But somehow it works. He’s also an incredibly good musician and a composer who will be admired and studied far into the future. He has taken jazz to new levels of popularity, for that’s what Steely Dan is, a jazz band that’s a bit heavy on guitars as solo instruments, though as everyone knows they include first-rank jazz horns and saxes too.
Also, their lyrics are genius, erudite and sometimes hyper-abstract, also funny and philosophical. Simply the best band of the last fifty years, in my opinion. If you can call Steely Dan a “band,” that is. It’s really just the sensibilities and musical vision of Donald Fagen and Walter Becker made real.
You might enjoy this 16-minute video.
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