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Steely Dan + Sklar?

#22
JimK said:
It's still mostly Rainey on Gaucho...isn't it? I seem to recall Anthony Jackson doing two stellar tracks ("My Rival" & "Glamour Profession") & Becker did a couple ("Gaucho" & "Time Out Of Mind")...the rest, IIRC, was Rainey (maybe 1/2 the tracks?).
Truth be told, I was a little peeved when I first bought Gaucho because Rainey's work was cut in 1/2.
IIRC, Rainey's studio work began to ebb about that time...more Jackson & Nathan East began popping up on the records that usually had Rainey's touch on them.
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yep. Two Jackson, two Rainey, three Becker. So, to the person asking about Becker grooves, he did do a number of grooves during their jazzier studio period. Hey 19, Gaucho and my favorite, Time Out of Mind. Earlier, he also did Deacon Blues, and maybe one track off of the Royal Scam.
 
#24
Tommy-P said:
I love steely dad but since I moved in with my mom I hav'nt got access to my dads cd's. If I was to go out and get one steely dan album today, in your opinion which should I get? Is there one particular album that epitomizes them? Can't really tell you what I think about those bassists though but that guy on their last dvd rules. They make fun of him in the extras for playing an esp instead of some expensive custom job that would do the same thing lol
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I'd recommend the Royal Scam. That's my favorite Steely Dan record. Beyond that, I happen to consider Two Against Nature as my second-favorite album by them, the conventional advice is to get Aja then. Initially, I almost tuned out to Steely Dan entirely due to the smoothness of Aja. I should've gotten the Scam first, but live and learn. On both Aja and the Royal Scam, Chuck Rainey is an unstoppable force.


And yes, that's Tom Barney on the DVD. He's a monster. "Gaslighting Abbie" is a great Tom Barney Dan track. Out of their most recent stuff, I really dig Freddie Washington's playing on Morph the Cat. Yeah, it's technically a fagen album, but I consider Fagen's solo stuff to be part of "Greater Steely Dan" or the large canon of Steely Dan. Though Becker's solo album is more like Warren Zevon than Steely Dan.
 
#26
On a tangent & a general head's up...
For more Rainey & the other Steely Dan session guys (+ Gary Katz' production), check out Eye To Eye's first album. When Gaucho became their swansong, this '80s Eye To Eye album was a God's send.

Both of their albums on 1 cd-
http://www.amazon.com/Eye-Shakespeare-Stole-My-Baby/dp/B000068TN4
 
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#28
JimK said:
Aja never impressed me as a "smooth" album...it is probably their most Jazz-influenced? Nothing "smooth" about Shorter's solo. ;)


No doubt there.
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I don't know. The whole production is pretty slick. Plus, listen to the Tom Scott solo on "Black Cow." If that ain't smooth, I don't know what it is. I have tons of Steely Dan soundboards, and I've seen them live, and I love the fact that they don't have anyone like Tom Scott or David Sanborn in the touring band. Hearing a real jazz cat like Cornelius Bumpus or Chris Potter or Walt Weiskopf play that solo blows away the original.


That being said, that whole album is very soft and smooth in terms of delivery. Here's my story of how I got into them. I'm currently 19 (and YES I REMEMBER THE QUEEN OF SOUL, and steely dan for that matter). My parents are about Donald and Walter's age (born in the late '40s), so they weren't of the generation that dug Steely Dan when it was coming out (people don't usually grow up listening to their exact contemporaries, there's usually a 5-10 year difference), so I didn't get into Steely Dan from them. Anyway, i had just heard enough references to them as being tantamount to God, that I went out and got some Dan in the spring of '05. I did my research so that I could figure out what to listen to first, and I kept on hearing that Aja was the best, so I got that. I listened to Black Cow many times, I really loved it, but as soon as I hit "Aja" I heard the lush piano and the twangy guitars, and I was just like "****! This sounds just like later-period Chicago." and I stopped cold. About 5 months later, I started listening beyond Black Cow and at first, there was part of it that was appealing, but I was a jazz snob and frowned upon anything that I thought sounded lightheaded and "pop." So I went across the street and talked to an old friend and musical mentor, a baby boomer dude. And I asked him point-blank whether Steely Dan was "sappy wimpy pop or truly creative, brilliant music." He told me that the latter was true, and this guy really knows his ****. So I went back and listened with no prejudice. As soon as my mind was open, I was in love. I subsequently went to the library and got the Citizen box, and dove into the other Dan all at once. eventually I got the newer Dan from a friend and bought Morph the day it came out.


All I'm saying is that if I heard a slightly edgier sound at first (the Royal Scam), it would've been much easier for me to get into it.
 
#29
ZenderBender said:
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yep. Two Jackson, two Rainey, three Becker. So, to the person asking about Becker grooves, he did do a number of grooves during their jazzier studio period. Hey 19, Gaucho and my favorite, Time Out of Mind. Earlier, he also did Deacon Blues, and maybe one track off of the Royal Scam.
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To me, what really spoils "Deacon Blues" is the dull plodding bass line - compared with the lithe inventiveness of Rainey's lines, it makes it almost dirge-like in contrast to the tracks around it! :(

The best tracks all have Rainey on them! :)

As to "smooth" - well at the time these albums came out - such a term was not in existence - and it was the sophistication of something like Aja that really stood out, compared with what else was out at the time.

In the late 70s/early 80s - the Dan were out on their own really...:)
 
#30
Bruce Lindfield said:
As to "smooth" - well at the time these albums came out - such a term was not in existence - and it was the sophistication of something like Aja that really stood out, compared with what else was out at the time.
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I agree 100%.
In '76, trust me, no one was a bigger Jazz snob than me (I was just getting into the various sub-genres, had just started loading up on Jazz records, etc. If it wasn't Jazz, it sucked!)...and that's exactly why I thought Aja was bad ass!

Granted, Chris Potter smokes Tom Scott & Sanborn. Will add that Tom Scott's earliest records were not "Smooth Jazz"...as a Jazz snob, I still loved the L.A. Express ("Rocket Island Rocket"...just played it the other night & it's still happenin', IMO). The New York Connection album may have been the beginning of Scott's move to "Smooth"...I say by Desire, he was firmly entrenched in that style (I don't think I bought anything by Scott after that).
Cornelius (RIP) Bumphus? I have only heard him in R&B/Rock types of settings...what Jazz records has he played on?

As far as the The Royal Scam-
Yes, it is probably the most guitar-driven album put out by SD...I love that record but, IMO, it doesn't make it "heavier" than Aja.
Some of the "heaviest" music out there is played on acoustic instruments...which may be either forte or pianissimo.

...just one man's opinion.
;)
 
#32
As for bass playing goes, and I may be on the outside here, I really dig Beckers playing on the disc "Everything Must Go". Not as the "best" of all the Dan material bass playing wise, but kinda cool none-the-less.
That slightly muted pick tone on a Jazz bass made me go back and revisit that type of playing. And some nice grooves too.
 
#33
I think you are - to me, that's exactly whats' wrong with Everything Must Go - the songs are kind of interesting, good production - but the rhythm section (bass and drums) is dull, dull, dull! :hmm:

It just makes me long for the invention, livelieness and excitement of the bass and drums on say : Josie or Peg etc etc. :(
 
#34
JimK said:
I agree 100%.


Cornelius (RIP) Bumpus? I have only heard him in R&B/Rock types of settings...what Jazz records has he played on?
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I don't think he's played on any RECORDS of jazz, but his sound is very much jazz, only played in a different context.



He really approaches that solo much more like Rollins than Tom Scott.




And I want to make it clear that I love the Dan. I'm just telling about how Aja's slick sound turned me off initially. I'm just trying to make the overall point that the best intro to Steely Dan is the Royal Scam. That's all. And I'll take your word for it that in '76 "smooth" wasn't a term in music yet, but I'm not listening to the album from the ears of back then. I got into Steely Dan in '05.
 
#36
ZenderBender said:
I'm just telling about how Aja's slick sound turned me off initially.
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It's all good...just funny how people have different perspectives. I love the sound/production of Aja. Fact is, I know many an enginneer that used that recording as 'a standard'. To me, each instrument sits just right in the mix...FWIW, I am not a fan of overdone production, either(i.e. pretty much anything out of Nashville or Davis Foster's slick L.A. thing).

And I'll take your word for it that in '76 "smooth" wasn't a term in music yet...
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The seeds of "Smooth" were certainly in place with George Benson's Breezin' & Grover Washington, Jr's Winelight...the onslaught really started with Kenny G's Duotones album & "Songbird".
...at least that's how I remember it.
;)
 
#37
So anyway, I'd love to see a rhythm section of maybe George Duke, Lee Sklar and Bernard Purdie on the next album. That would make my day.


In other observations, I'm pretty happy that Carol Kaye did not play on a Steely Dan album. I could imagine her playing on maybe one track (maybe something like "Hey Nineteen") and then running around screaming "Kid Charlemagne? That was MEEEEEEEEE! Black Cow was MEEEEEE. Josie was me! Don't Take me Alive was me! I don't care what Donald, Walter, Eliot Scheiner, Roger Nichols, Gary Katz or Larry Carlton say. It was me! Don and Walt have an AGENDA TO PROMOTE CHUCK RAINEY!"
 
#38
JimK said:
I agree 100%.
The New York Connection album may have been the beginning of Scott's move to "Smooth"...I say by Desire, he was firmly entrenched in that style (I don't think I bought anything by Scott after that).
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Can you recommend some good L.A. Express? The only thing I have by them is "Court and Spark" where they back up Joni Mitchell. I love the lyricism of Carlton on "Help Me."
 
#39
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