By Bruce Westbrook
Houston Chronicle
“Two Against Nature”
Steely Dan
Giant
After a two-decade wait, perhaps we should be glad to hear any new album by Steely Dan.
That seems to be the stance of many critics, who are making this the most hyped disc of the year so far.
Hear! the smooth sounds. Exalt! in sublime production values. Thrill! to immaculate musicianship. Wallow! in the lush jazz. Make that the jazz, the whole jazz and nothing but the jazz.
The fact is, Steely Dan has meant more. It began in the ’70s as a pop-rock band, then charted a challenging course through jazz, blues and R&B before splintering in 1981.
In its return, the core duo of keyboardist-singer Donald Fagen and guitarist Walter Becker has narrowed that vision to the sleek, precise, sophisticated jazz grooves of its 1977 smash “Aja.”
Fagen and Becker pick up that old sound as if they’d never taken a break – and, disturbingly, as if they hadn’t changed or grown in the interim.
Granted, what sounded good two decades ago sounds good now. This album also nicely evokes Fagen’s fine 1982 solo disc, “The Nightfly.”
We don’t expect Steely Dan to bolster its sound with token rockers such as “Reelin’ in the Years” or brassy, boisterous pop such as “My Old School.” But while mining the light funk of its polished jazz groove, a little energy and innovation wouldn’t hurt.
The problem isn’t the soft sound but its mellow monotony, compounded by the undistinctiveness of the songs. All were composed, arranged and produced by Fagen and Becker, with Fagen taking charge of reeds and horns.
The nine tracks blur with an unsettling sameness, and though their lyrics can be clever, their melodies are mundane.
In “Almost Gothic,” Fagen sings of a woman as if she’d blinded him with science, rhapsodizing, “I’m so excited I can barely cope. I’m sizzling like an isotope.”
In “What a Shame About Me,” he sings of a man’s chance meeting with an old female school chum who’s become a star. He, meanwhile, is just out of rehab.
“I’m still working on that novel,” Fagen says, “but I’m just about to quit, ’cause I’m worrying about the future now, or maybe this is it.”
Similarly, Steely Dan’s future seems to be its past. “Two Against Nature” is not a long-awaited journey to a new frontier. It’s a safe soft landing on familiar ground, without the former zeal for exploration.
Grade: C+
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