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Posted: **Mon Aug 11, 2008 12:23 pm**

Man, fuck Steely Dan

Posted: **Mon Aug 11, 2008 12:40 pm**

itchy mcgoo wrote:It's the soundtrack to opening your package from the Hair Club for Men commercial.

I like SD, but this sentence is 100% win.

Posted: **Mon Aug 11, 2008 12:51 pm**

tmidgett wrote:I find the "[fill in the blank] FOR FAGS" or "gay-ass pedophile jazz" kind of criticisms to be telling.

One thing Steely Dan does supremely well is make people uncomfortable.

You might think "well, they make me uncomfortable because the music drives me up the fucking wall," and that's fine.

But they have a way of essaying various creepy subjects casually, amorally, and in great detail.

It's that particular combination that is unsettling.

It gives you nowhere to go with it. At least when William Bennett is going on about coming up your ass etc., there's nothing casual about it. You feel OK being kind of amped up about it to some degree.

But these guys will write about rough trade or whiling away one's life drunk and drugged or pedophilia or whatever, and take no position on it whatsoever. Yet they are tremendously invested in it--they detail it obsessively, and they keep going into the same wells, the same way someone who was feeding a perversion or had some ax to grind would.

The music is jarring for exactly the same reasons. The sounds are rounded off and the arrangements are just-so, but it's so impeccably played that it attains a sharpness that other music 'like this' (no one else has ever sounded like them) never ever gets. There's a malicious glint to it that is unexpected.

And what they do is resolutely in its own space. It never, ever comes out to get you--you have to go to it. It gets under your skin real quick if you don't take to it.

I love Steely Dan because I take to it for whatever reason, and I always have. But a nice side effect is the fact that, despite its round edges and professionalism, it inspires such venom. It's not forgettable music, in any case.

This is an eloquent explanation of Steely Dan, certainly, but I don't buy it. Steely Dan have never made me uncomfortable in the least, and any venom I've had for this band has not been a result of its slick sound, the songs' calculatedly lurid subject matter, or the combination of both.

What irritates me about this band is the affectation, and the idea that they think they're transgressive because they marry absurdly smooth music to sleazy lyrics in a way that doesn't emphasize the "sleaze" aspect or pass judgment on the sordid things the lyrics address. This is not interesting in the least.

I don't care enough about Steely Dan to read interviews with them or anything, but their approach leads me to believe that they think they're getting something over on unsuspecting audiences. I don't think they are.

Steely Dan's problem is that their music and lyrics alike are wholly unremarkable. Anyone who half-pays attention to the words will immediately realize the band is doing schtick in an attempt to give their bland music a degree of seedy appeal.

There is nothing subversive about this band, and nothing in their music interests me in the least. At least William Bennett and company are funny.

CRAP.

Posted: **Mon Aug 11, 2008 5:27 pm**

Wow! 15 pages so far...

I don't understand the extreme polarization here. Man, I've always taken and left SD at face value. I don't hate it; don't love it either.

To me it has always been music that Pro Audio dealers throw on when they want you to hear how awesome the piece of gear they're showing you is. Its impeccable production and precision and that nice dry sound bring out the best in a pair of speakers, or amp, or input channel. Whatever.

It's really not anything to get upset over, or fall in love with. It's not subversive enough to get excited about, and it's not quite bland or uninspired enough to hate. It just is. I don't ever choose to listen to SD, but when it's on, I tend to sit back and enjoy it for what it is. Most of my hearing it revolves around pro audio gear demos and concert system checkouts, that type of thing, so maybe part of it is that when I hear it, I'm on the clock and it doesn't matter so much.

I can understand some of the vitriol though, considering the disdain many folks on here hold for their influences and contemporaries: West Coast Cool Jazz, Zappa, Jaco Pastorius, and Fusion in general to name a few.

Posted: **Mon Aug 11, 2008 5:51 pm**

givemenoughrope wrote:'Jazz' for Rush fans.

I hate Rush and most Jazz. I love Steely Dan.

siincerely,
Ain't never gonna do it without the Faiz on.

Posted: **Mon Aug 11, 2008 6:05 pm**

Steely Dan are playing near me on August 15. I wonder if I should go. I have never knowingly listened to Steely Dan.

Posted: **Mon Aug 11, 2008 7:01 pm**

SecondEdition wrote:Steely Dan are playing near me on August 15. I wonder if I should go. I have never knowingly listened to Steely Dan.

I'd recommend the studio recordings instead. Live now...is a very different band from the Steely Dan of the 70s.

Posted: **Mon Aug 11, 2008 8:04 pm**

SecondEdition wrote:I wonder if I should go.

Yes. Go and shoot them in the face. Shit sucks shit.

Listen to the shit they play behind the local forecasts on the Weather Channel for two hours if you can't make it for some sane reason.

Posted: **Mon Aug 11, 2008 8:10 pm**

Maurice wrote:
SecondEdition wrote:Steely Dan are playing near me on August 15. I wonder if I should go. I have never knowingly listened to Steely Dan.

I'd recommend the studio recordings instead. Live now...is a very different band from the Steely Dan of the 70s.

True. If you would like to hear the band as they are now, you can always listen to their two albums they've made post-2000. However, fans of the original Steely Dan line-up - at least in my experience - are not too fond of the band's most recent releases. I would largely agree with Maurice about listening to the recordings before seeing the live performance. I don't think it would matter though once you decide if you like them or not. Also, I think tickets might be a little costly, so it's more affordable to buy CDs and/or MP3s instead.

I think Steely Dan deserves a tip-of-the-hat for actuallly making new music and going in a different direction rather than reuniting to milk the hits from "Aja" like they easily could have.

Posted: **Mon Aug 11, 2008 8:14 pm**

vockins wrote:
SecondEdition wrote:I wonder if I should go.

Yes. Go and shoot them in the face. Shit sucks shit.

Listen to the shit they play behind the local forecasts on the Weather Channel for two hours if you can't make it for some sane reason.

I laughed. Salut, vockins!

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Band: Steely Dan

Band: Steely Dan

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Band: Steely Dan

Band: Steely Dan

Band: Steely Dan

Band: Steely Dan

Band: Steely Dan

Band: Steely Dan