Editor’s Note: From 1987 through 1994, diehard Steely Dan fans turned to a small fanzine called Metal Leg for information about Donald Fagen and Walter Becker. Published first by England’s Brian Sweet (who went on to write the unofficial band biography Steely Dan: Reelin’ In The Years) and later by New Yorkers Pete Fogel and […]
Tag Archives | Recordings
Steely Dan: Gaucho
By Mitchell Cohen Creem She stomped into the living room, as much as one can stomp in pink slippers and an extra-large Close Encounters t-shirt, and conspicuously clicked the “stop” button of the cassette machine. I continued to write. “Steely Dan,” she announced, “are a symptom of everything that is wrong with our relationship.” Conversations that start with sentences […]
‘Gaucho’ Review
By Ariel Swartley Rolling Stone The thing you begin to notice, listening to Steely Dan’s songs, is that no one ever answers anyone. For all the talk — and their latest album, Gaucho, is as compulsively chatty as dinnertime on death row — there’s no conversation. Whoever keeps asking, “Who is that gaucho, amigo?” might as well […]
‘Gaucho’: The Sardonic Style of Steely Dan
By Stephen Holden New York Times Nearly three years in the making, Steely Dan’s Gaucho (MCA-6102) is as refined as pop music can get without becoming too esoteric for a mass audience. Though it consists of only two men, Steely Dan must be counted one of the most influential rock “groups” of the past decade. […]
An LP with Ironies in the Fire
By Richard Cromelin Los Angeles Times If anyone else had come out with a song called “Gaucho,” the title character would be a man in black fresh off the pampas, reeking of romance and mystery. Steely Dan’s gaucho is a comically pathetic figure in a less than romantic situation. The singer’s girlfriend has picked him […]
Steely Dan: The Royal Scam Review
Originally published on Aug. 24, 1976 By Bud Scoppa Circus Donald Fagen and Walter Becker don’t play by the rules. They won’t tour, they won’t talk to interviewers, they won’t keep a band together — instead they prefer to ship out their best players to the Doobie Brothers and hire hand-picked freelance musicians for specific parts […]
‘Katy Lied’: The truth is superfine
Originally published on May 4, 1975 STEELY DAN: ‘KATY LIED’ (ABC Records ABCL 5094). YOU KNOW how it is with these aces: first time, you think, human tasty muzak; next play, you start to ge hooked onto a melody here and there and a fragment or two of those enigmatic lyrics; the third time around […]
Steely Dan: Katy Lied
Originally published on May 1, 1975 By Steven Rosen Circus Raves EIGHT-THIRTY PM. On the sixteenth story of a monster New York skyscraper a lonely light shone at the end of a cavernous floor. The deserted space was a storage center for office furniture; 36 desks piled up, dozens of sofas in heaps, desks, swivel […]
Stainless Steely Band
By Bud Scoppa Rolling Stone Steely Dan is the most improbable hit-singles band to emerge in ages. On its three albums, the group has developed an impressionistic approach to rock & roll that all but abandons many musical conventions and literal lyrics for an unpredictable, free-roving style. While the group considered the first album, Can’t […]
