Godwhacker

I don’t know who or what at godwhacker is, but it sounds like it would make a good comic book. Perhaps it could be about two elderly Brooklyn Jews who run a bookstore by day and solve crimes by night. Becuase Becker and Fagen are so twerpy they just have to be harboring superpowers. Oh, wait, music is their superpower.

F.M.

This is funny. Well, not in and of itself, but in context, somehow. The fact that the song is a tale of seduction, from what I can gather, coupled with, when you watch the video, Donald Fagen’s looks equals hilarity. Fagen looks like a bus stop stalker and to hear him invite a presumable girl to kick her shoes off and party is a wee bit creepy. And a lot of Steely Dan songs are tales of seduction, Hey Nineteen being particularly skeevy. In fairness, Fagen hasn’t always looked like something that washed up on the side of the highway, yet nor was he ever exactly kitty-bait, if you catch my meaning. Songs definitely can gather an unintended layer of context based on what the performer happens to look like. This one for sure would be less creepily amusing coming from the mouth of someone handsome.

Everything Must Go

“I move to dissolve the corporation /In a pool of margaritas”

Between 1972 and 2003 nothing much has changed. Not for Steely Dan, leastways. They made their string of impeccable, jazz-tinted soft rock albums over the course of the seventies, broke apart in 1980 and came back in 2000 sounding as if not a day had passed. And people bought it, just as they always had. Everything Must Go was their most recent, now almost a decade old, and just as good as anything else they’d done. The title track is all aglow with their signature cynically black humor, and since ’03 it’s suddenly begun sounding less like jokey satire and more a dryly relevant look at what they call ‘the real side’.

Do It Again

Classic of seventies pop radio. I don’t know much about Steely Dan. Except that their name means something naughty (yes, it does, go look it up). And I’ve heard Donald and Walter aren’t always the funnest guys to work with. And, jeez louise, are they ugly.

Deacon Blues

Did you miss me? Vacation being over, almost, back to business. Introducing lost souls to good causes, and other worthwhile pursuits…

Bodhisattva

The old fm radio standby as you’ve never seen it before. Some clever Youtube user has found the perfect video accompaniment to Steely Dan’s 1973 hit Bodhisattva. The mesmerizing Dance of the Thousand-hand Bodhisattva was performed in 2005 by a Chinese dance troupe of the hearing-impaired.

BTW, isn’t there something about this song that sounds somehow wrong? Like it’s dragging at the wrong speed? Especially in the middle part, it sounds like it does when you’re playing your vinyl and the electricity flickers and the turntable momentarily slows down, then picks back up. Or is it just me?

Blues Beach

Blues Beach, Steely Dan, Everything Must Go, 2003

Steely Dan really are an unusual case. They had their moment in the 70s,  broke up for twenty years then came back. Here’s the weird part; they came back as good as ever. Not too many groups can do that, just pick up where they left off as if decades hadn’t passed.

I was scrapin’ bottom
Gropin’ in the dark
It takes a crusty punk to really beat
The mean streets of Medicine Park
So I shifted left for out of town
Then I clicked my heels and I doubled down to

Blues Beach
I’m frying
Sizzlin’ in the merciful rays
And it’s the long sad Sunday
Of the early resigned

I went to Central Station
To catch that early bus
They were gassed and runnin’ every which way
But unhappily not for us
Here comes Trina — the child bride
I said hey pretty girl — can I cop a ride to

Blues Beach
It’s rainin’
I’m chillin’ at the Manatee Bar
Well it’s a stone soul picnic
For the early resigned

We could rent a paranymphic glider
My hypothetical friend
And we could sail
‘Til the bending end

Grab Big Dog a blanket
Angel of my heart
Things may get a whole lot worse
Before suddenly falling apart
Give your roommate Yvonne a ring
Cause if she still wants in I gotta pull some strings

On Blues Beach
I’m dying
Freezin’ in the merciful rays
And it’s the long sad Sunday
Of the early resigned

Vocals, piano, organ: Donald Fagen
Bass, solo guitar: Walter Becker
Drums: Keith Carlock
Guitar: Jon Herington, Hugh McCracken
Rhodes: Ted Baker
Percussion: Gordon Gottlieb
Background vocal: Carolyn Leonhart

Black Friday

Contrary to popular belief, Black Friday does not refer to the stock market crash of 1929. The term has come to signify any stock market disaster, but the term originally referred to an event that took place in 1869. During the Civil War the government put a large amount of paper money into circulation. After the war, plans were made to exchange the greenbacks for gold. A group of conniving speculators attempted to create a monopoly on gold by buying up all the stock. The price of gold soared, the stock market went into a spin, and investors paniced. Fortunately, the government figured out what was going on and took steps to fix the problem with no long term damage to the economy.

BLACK FRIDAY

 

When Black Friday comes
I’ll stand down by the door
And catch the grey men when they
Dive from the fourteenth floor
When Black Friday comes
I’ll collect everything I’m owed
And before my friends find out
I’ll be on the road
When Black Friday falls you know it’s got to be
Don’t let it fall on meWhen Black Friday comes
I’ll fly down to Muswellbrook
Gonna strike all the big red words
From my little black book
Gonna do just what I please
Gonna wear no socks and shoes
With nothing to do but feed
All the kangaroos
When Black Friday comes I’ll be on that hill
You know I will

When Black Friday comes
I’m gonna dig myself a hole
Gonna lay down in it ’til
I satisfy my soul
Gonna let the world pass by me
The Archbishop’s gonna sanctify me
And if he don’t come across
I’m gonna let it roll
When Black Friday comes
I’m gonna stake my claim
I’ll guess I’ll change my name

Black Cow

Black Cow, what? Is that a drink? Never heard of it.

Bad Sneakers

Bad Sneakers, Steely Dan, Katy Lied, 1975

More classic Steely Dan for you. The story about this album is that the notorious perfectionists Becker and Fagen considered it a failure because of some minor glitches with the sound system. These imperfections are not audible to the garden-variety amateur listener.