By Laura Sinagra New York Times NEW YORK — Those meticulous jazz-rockers Steely Dan built a career on seeming coolly unfazed. But the solo efforts of its principals, Donald Fagen and his snarkier counterpart, Walter Becker, prove what we all knew: that insouciant affect is usually the result of peer pressure. We can only be […]
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Steely Dan Man Makes N.Y. Return
By Kevin O’Donnell Rolling Stone The last time Steely Dan frontman Donald Fagen performed at New York’s Beacon Theater was in 1991 with the “New York Rock and Soul Revue,” an informal collective of musicians that included Boz Scaggs and Michael McDonald. Tuesday night, some fifteen years later, the singer and keyboardist came home. While […]
Donald Fagen, Cool and Partly Steely
By Dave McKenna Washington Post WASHINGTON — Donald Fagen never had much “Louie Louie” in him. Still doesn’t. There is little obvious difference between the output of Steely Dan, the franchise that Fagen and Walter Becker founded in the early 1970s and have occasionally reassembled, and the solo works Fagen presented at the Warner Theatre […]
Steely Dan’s Donald Fagen Explains Quirks
By Steve James Reuters NEW YORK – Somehow the idea of rock musician Donald Fagen working in a Borders book store or teaching high-school literature is about as likely as an unambiguous Steely Dan song lyric. He is, after all, a creative force behind Steely Dan, one of rock music’s most quirky but literate bands. […]
‘Morph the Cat’
By John Kelman Allaboutjazz.com Sometimes tight-knit teams like Donald Fagen and Walter Becker — better known as Steely Dan — make it difficult to determine what each individual brings to the table. It’s no secret that Becker and Fagen have strong jazz sensibilities, not to mention an affection for Tin Pan Alley, having started out […]
Fagen’s Solo Act Succeeds
By A.D. Amorosi For the Philadelphia Inquirer PHILADELPHIA — It is tempting to claim that the Donald Fagen — pop’s cheeriest misanthrope — who sold out the Tower on Saturday was little more than Steely Dan without other-half Walter Becker. Fagen’s lyrical concerns have the same apocalyptic sarcasm, yearning retro-futurism, messy romanticism, and midlife-crisis clamoring […]
‘Morph the Cat’
By Edna Gundersen USA Today Morph the Cat (* * *) Donald Fagen Fagen’s third solo album, and first in 13 years, completes an informal trilogy that includes the frisky ambitions of 1981’s Nightfly and the midlife inventory of 1993’s Kamakiriad. This time the Steely Dan co-founder dwells on mortality and various impending doom scenarios, […]
Review of ‘Morph the Cat’
By Richard Cromelin Los Angeles Times LOS ANGELES — The taller half of Steely Dan returns from a 13-year break from solo albums as a sort of hipster Dr. Seuss. In the title song, a protoplasmic feline form permeates Manhattan, casting an inexplicable but welcome spell of well-being on Gotham. Less cartoon-like but similarly whimsical, […]
One Cool Cat
By Jane Stevenson Toronto Sun TORONTO – Donald Fagen, one half of smart, sarcastic, ’70s jazz-rockers Steely Dan, had a serious case of writers block in the ’80s. But lately the 58-year-old New Jersey-born, Manhattan-based singer-keyboardist-songwriter has been experiencing his most creative period. After two Steely Dan albums — 2000’s Two Against Nature and 2003’s […]
Donald Fagen: ‘Morph the Cat’
By David Randall Getreadytorock.com I know, it’s awfully uncool to admit you like a Donald Fagen album. Maybe I’m suffering from post-Steely Dan crisis. The erstwhile Dan co-founder, “voice” and keyboards player is back with only his third solo album. In 1982 it was the critically-acclaimed The Nightfly, in 1993 Kamakiriad. ‘Morph The Cat’ has […]
