Classical Composer Reacts to STEELY DAN: AJA (side 2): Peg, Home At Last, I Got The News, & Josie
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- Опубликовано: 26 сен 2024
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#steelydan #steelydanreaction #steelydanaja #aja
In this #masterpiecefriday edition of #thedailydoug, I'm completing my full album review of Aja by Steely Dan. Today, we're listening to side 2, with the songs Peg, Home at Last, I Got the News, and Josie. I loved this side as much if not better than the first. All the songs are top notch and expertly played. It's a true historic album! (Ep. 848)
Reference Video: • Aja
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your next reaction is guacho probably my second fave album and of course aja is first for me !
Donald Fagans first solo album after the breakup, The Nightfly, is pure joy. Please do anything from that masterpiece. Take care🙋♂
IGY is one of my all-time favorites - *_"programmed by fella's - with compassion and vision."_* And this was written in about 1976...
His follow-up, Karmakiriad, might even be a little better (even if it's such a strange name and concept)
After GAUCHO, we assumed SD were done.
Then THE NIGHTFLY was released. Wow, we were thrilled.
TBH, Fagen's followup album didn't really float my boat.
Everything they do it perfect
One of the best albums ever made tbh
Certainly one of the best produced albums.
Home at Last. Think Homer's "The Odyssey", that tired sea song. Odysseus is sailing home from Troy, wants to hear the Siren's song, plugs his crew's ears with wax so they can''t hear the Sirens, and has his crew tie him to the mast so that he (Odysseus) won't be able to have the ship steered into the rocks. So powerful is the song of the Sirens that Ody thinks he is already home.
"Hey guys, you can let me down now. No more rocks.. Hey guys! Guys?"
Donald Fagan for Musician Laureate!
It's a metaphor for LA.
Most people don't really talk about Home at Last or I Got the News when talking about this album, but both are gems! Home at Last is one of my favorite songs ever!
I love Home At Last’ So soot. Makes me think of driving late at night in the city.
Yeah, "Home At Last" is easily my favorite song on _Aja_ .
Alone, lights off, a glass of red wine and this album on pretty loud. Perfection.
Without a doubt.
Loud enough to sound real, and add in a bit of high quality “smoke” for me please. Listen all the way through.
There was a “classic albums” dvd made around 2000 about the making of this record. You should watch and react to it, it’s on RUclips and it’s incredible especially for musicians and big fans of the band
That whole series was great!
Uptown baby, uptown baby
Classic Albums was a fantastic show and the one about Aja was (IMO) the best. I had to get a copy on DVD so I could watch it whenever I want.
Yes, that was a great video. Any Steely Dan fan should watch it.
you gotta do royal scam. More specifically:
- dont take me alive
- caves of altamira
- kid charlemange
are all crazy
I believe he already did Kid Charlemagne
Also Green Earrings! Doug has done Kid Charlemagne.
_Aja_ is Steely Dan's best album, but _Royal Scam_ is my favorite.
Doug, you nailed it during “Peg” when you said, “the melodies are diatonic but the way the chord voicings move is really sophisticated.” So many of the legendary guitar solos from Steely Dan that I’ve studied are diatonic and even pentatonic-based like any old rock tune, but the sophisticated chords and voice leading make it really stand out.
Josie was always my favorite Steely Dan track. Just love the groove. 😎
Chuck Rainy is unbelievable on these tracks... I forgot how great he is. Also, I really, really love the Horn arrangements on all of these tracks. Thanks Doug!
One of the GREATEST albums of all time...
words cannot express how much I love Josie. Possibly on of the coolest guitar parts of all time in that intro.
Aimee Nolte breaks this tune down and shows that Peg is a blues, very interesting. Home at Last is a retelling of the Greek myth of Ulysses. And last, please, if you haven't already, do The Royal Scam!
Great tunes and a killer solo by Larry Carlton on Kid Charlemagne.
Jay Graydon has a YT vid breaking down his solo on "Peg"... yes, he mentions it as a Blues, as well.
Altered blues for sure. That was the advice Donald gave Jay Graydon when recording the solo. "think blues." Then he got it!
I grew up with these songs, but listening to them with you makes me feel like I'm hearing them for the first time!
Wonderful - more Steely Dan is always a good thing
Have a listen to Donald Fagen's album "The Nightfly" too!
Ruby!
The lyrics from Home At Last are reportedly a commentary/summary about Homer's " The Iliad "
Sounds more like the Odyssey to me...tied to the mast...home at last...
@@underwoodvoice9077 yes, I had a brainfart
*_The Odyssey_,, but yeah 🙂
Home at Last is my favorite Steely Dan song!
Have been listening to this album since 1977, could listen to it every day and not grow tired of it.
One of the best albums ever. Got me into jazz.
I bought this on its release and it stayed on my turntable forever!
The perversion on Peg when the jilted boyfriend realizes he'll be enthralled by her soft pont picture: "I know I'll love you better." What a classic single and solo. You are correct that Peg is one of those Steely-ized altered blues with jazzy progressions. The title track from Pretzel Logic and Chin Lightning from Katy Lied, and What a Shame About Me from the Grammy winning Two Against Nature are other examples.
I believe that this was Steely Dan's Opus Magnus. High end audiophiles to this day still use this album to test out their amplifiers and speakers even though it was recorded on analog tape.
this one and "Red and Orange" from John Abercrombie's "Timeless."
Just didn't realize how good we had it back then, with so much great music coming out on the regular.
“She prays like a Roman with her eyes on fire.” is such a wild lyric to end a chorus on. Very Steely Dan.
Doug, you're absolutely right. "They write just as good as.they play!"
They do indeed
Thanks for the great review, and listening as we all did.back in the day, a side at a time.
Note with the diatonic melody and the voicings and Rick Marotta's drums how Pegs SWINGS. You can really here it in the outtro of chorus repeats. Rock music that swings like jazz. It's nearly miraculous - incredibly complicated music that SOUNDS SIMPLE. Genius.
Notice Marotta doesn’t use any toms or fills? He said he didn’t like the sound of them so simply avoided playing them. Genius.
One of the best produced albums in history!!
Peg. . My favorite song about a dude trying to talk a girl into appearing in a p&rn movie. .
YES! That's what it's all about. . "And when you smile for the camera, I know they're gonna love you"
Probably the best recorded pop album ever. The boys' ultra-meticulous nature sure paid off.... Just an amazing recording.
The bass player on Peg, said he turned his back during the slapping part in the chirus because they said NO Slapping. But they didn't notice and loved it! ahhaha!
Home at Last has the most beautiful chord progression and funky groove.
One of the best albums ever! LOVE IT! So subtle and complex and great lyrics. Best melding of jazz and pop/rock. Aja was introduced to me when I was in to Genesis and YES and it took a minute... but amazing. Thanks you!
The great Chuck Rainey....
His double stops on the intro are sublime.
Rainey's playing on all the Steely Dan stuff is a clinic. I recall being a little miffed when Rainey wasn't used as much on GAUCHO.
The thumb FTW!
"you'll have to ask Chuck about the thumb business"... Classic
I love most Steely Dan songs, but Home at Last just grabbed me, immediately. The illusions to Homer's The Odyssey are intriguing, but it's just glorious, musically.
Some of the finest music ever produced, B&F are and were musicsl geniuses. Walter RIP.
You would probably enjoy the documentary The Making Of Aja, where Walter and Donald, among others, go through track by track giving the insights of how and what they did during the writing and recording of the album. It's on youtube but broken into different parts, still, an insightful and interesting experience, there are things in there you could never know just by listening to the album...
The lyricon was played most famously by Chuck Greenberg of the New Age 80’s group Shadowfax.
I have been a Steely Dan fan for a long time and, in my opinion, this is their greatest album. It is one of those perfect albums that doesn't have a bad song on it. I am not a musician but simply enjoy this as a listener. I am pleased that Doug, who is an accomplished musician, has such great appreciation for it. It validates my feeling that this album, and others by Dan, are something special.
"Home at Last" is my favorite song on this album, and I'm pleased that it was never released as a single, so it never got overplayed. Lyrically, the song is based on Homer's Odyssey. (Odysseus had his crew plug their ears with wax as they passed the sirens on the rocks, while Odysseus himself, who could still hear, was tied to the mast so that he would not be able to respond to the sirens.)
Also, what you read on "I Got the News" was not Becker & Fagen. It was from the liner notes (remember those?) written by critic Michael Phalen. I don't think a member of the band would have said anything that negative about their own song on their own new album. In fact, I'm surprised that comment got into the album notes at all.
Peg was my next door neighbor in 1977. I was 17 and she was 20. Wouldn't give me the time of day. Then I left home and later on found out that she had a thing for cops. But there will always be the song!
Well said… just listening to Steely Dan makes you feel a quite sophisticated cat. People know you have class and taste. Just as real back in the days, as is true today….🤘🏼😎
“Danger on the rocks has surely passed still I remain tied to the mast” is a reference Greek mythology. Ulysses.
One of my favorite albums of all time. Every track is perfection. It’s the kind of album you listen to all the way through each time. A masterpiece of composition, musicianship, and recording, perfectly written, performed, and engineered.
Battle apple: Unlike many other of Becker & Fagen's imaginary concoctions, we can be fairly sure about this one since Donald Fagen explicitly referenced it in a July 2011 interview with The Wall Street Journal. Quote: "Walter and I both love inventing slang. For example, in 'Josie', there's a street gang using a weapon called the 'battle apple'. It sounded better than any real weapon we could think of."
What exactly a battle apple would look like is left up to the imagination of the listener.
Also: The Apple of Discord is a reference to a mythological event in which three goddesses fought over an apple. Ptolemaeus Chennus wrote that the goddesses fought over who would get a man named Melus ("apple") as her priest. Paris decided in favor of Aphrodite.
Michael talks about how difficult it was for him to harmonize with himself because of how close each track was in terms of key.
more specifically, the note intervals in the vocal harmony parts. Oftentimes half-step b/c of the extended chords. So he probably had to record each voiceover individually WITHOUT listening to what he'd previously done.
GESTALT IS A GOOD SUMMATION OF HOW TIGHTLY KNIT THESE MUSICIANS MELDED TOGETHER TO MAKE SUCH EPIC MUSIC.
Great to enjoy this great music and your reaction on a Friday. This is one of those albums that winds up on all our mythical 'top 10' lists that actually have more than 10 albums.
Thanks for doing this one Doug. Ahhhh............ my first year of high school. The memories come flooding back every time I listen to Aja. And the title track........... I play that when I'm feeling melancholy and moody. Haha. PLEASE react to more 'Dan. Try Pretzel Logic. It's incredible too !!
"It's your favorite foreign movie."
The mystery solo instrument on “Home at Last” is a lyricon, which is basically a saxophone based MIDI controller. Remember, this was when they were first starting to try and connect MIDI to everything.
I though it was a melodica.
So many great highschool memories attached to this band and this album in particular. Glad you enjoyed it as much as I did.
Peg and Josie were both radio hits. I'd be surprised if you'd never heard either one. Amazing chord progressions and solos.
I got the News is just unusual and lively and jazzy as hell
You should really check out Donald Fagan's solo albums. His Nightly album is just as good as anything Steely Dan did and his Kamakiriad was produced by Walter Becker (with Becker playing all the bass and guitar parts). It is a very under rated album and it is essentially a Steely Dan project.
Thanks for this. An album that still mesmerizes me, musically. Includes what is, for me, one of SD's greatest-ever songs: "Home At Last," for me the highlight of this LP and the piece with the most resonance, even 47 years after it was recorded.
Your ears and experience are super-legit. You discern & explain the most important elements of the music, e.g., the separation of the produced sound coming from each musician (no one steps on anyone else, and there's usually a syncopation between the kick-drum and the bass pattern); the basic movement of the overall harmonic structure (notwithstanding the complex extended chords that provide color and deception, as well as laying a comfy bed for the sophisticated instrumental solos over them), and more.
In terms of guitar soloing on this LP, I've always appreciated Walter Becker's solos, also evident on cuts from "Royal Scam" like "Green Earrings." He plays what I like to call "outlines" of solos, or the "edges" of a solo. He might not wow you with single-string pyrotechnics like a Larry Carlton, but what he does is so tasteful and correct, in service to and advancement of the musical story, and which can be featured without drowning out everything else that's going on and worth listening to. A parallel to him on drums might be Supertramp's Bob C. Benberg. If you listen to the way he constructs a drum track you'll get the idea.
BTW, lately I've watched your vids mostly on my TV via the RUclips app. I say that b/c yours is one of the ONLY channels that I will wait for the ridiculously long commercials to complete, when they can't be skipped. But I can't leave comments via a TV app, so I'm sending this from my desktop.
One of the greatest albums in the history of history!
This is a fantastic album. A favorite of mine. You can hear where Snarky Puppy gets some of their inspiration from.
I love all the songs!!! I’d love to hear you analyze their Two Against Nature album. Lots of unusual key modulations!
"Almost Gothic" is right up your alley, then? 🙂 BTW, Rachel, I love your ELP stuff. Even have your global "Sheriff" collaboration saved and on my PLEX server, so I queue it up often. That's a genuine pick-me-upper, great stuff.
Thanks. 🤓 2:01
Steely Dan! Your favorite bands favorite band 🔥🤘✌
Becker and Fagen obviously felt otherwise, but "HAL" just SCREAMS "end-of-the-album track", for me.
"Home At Last" is my jam... a very close second behind the title track. Just can't beat the AWESOME drumming in "Aja!"... but, really everything about "Aja"... such a masterpiece!!! The synth instrument that caught your ear in this tune is called a Lyricon played by Tom Scott... this is known not because I have a great ear or I'm a musician, I found this out from "Professor of Rock" RUclips channel.
This was the first album of theirs i owned… on cassette… and i played it until it wouldn’t play anymore. As the age of CD’s dawned, i got the “Citizen Steely Dan” box set… and started acquiring Donald Fagen CD’s
Great hearing this again, Thanks Doug.
How have you never heard "Josie?" About as funky as it gets! Anyway, as a Senior in High School in 1980, if you didn't know SD, you didn't know sh*t. I was totally into heavy stuff back then but, they were in your face during the 70's and were, and still, are spectacular. Song writing, recording and producing at its' best. I get complete control of the music at my job and play their complete catalog at least once a week. They're just that good and it never gets old!
Bernard Purdie calls it the "Purdie Shuffle".
'Home at Last' is pure lyrical genius (as are many, many of their lyrics). Multiple meanings shielded by a 'Homer' hip-fake. Thanks, Doug!
I loved them due to their unusual chords/harmonies.
That was great. Love that you covered the whole album. There may be a few who rival Steely Dan's sophistication, but no one surpasses them. Always top tier musicianship. Always.
Next to the title track, Josie is my favorite song on this album.
I can't tell you how many times I commuted to work in Brooklyn both via the Staten Island Ferry, and later when I moved to New Jersey - on the Academy Bus listening to this album.
It took the stress away.
My dad is huge Steely fan and I used to hate them when I was younger. But some time in high school I started to understand the Dan. No one like them.
There's a two part RUclips video on the making of "Peg". This song is so much more complex than just a pop/blues song.
The Purdie shuffle! Donald and Walter told Bernard they wanted a shuffle but not. He gave it to them. The subject matter is based on the Odyssey.
When you simply get the best session men to play for you, you can request pretty much anything and know they will deliver.
I heard a rumour that Rona Barrett was the "Broadway Duchess" in "I got the News".
They broke up because of Walter's drug habit. His supplier was hanging around the studio and Donald told him it had to stop. The song Goucho is about the drug dealer. So Walter moved to Hawaii to get himself clean while Donald began a solo career. Loved their music for years.
Steely Dan started out as an actual band of 5 members and remained for their first 3 albums before continuing as a duo!
The instrument you didn't recognize was the Lyricon, played by Tom Scott. Also, the rhythm played by Bernard Purdie on drums is called "The Purdie Shuffle", as a bonus fact :)
Meticulously crafted doesn't begin to describe this album. It really was a remarkable achievement in writing, recording and performance.
“Do you call it pop?Do you call it jazz? Do you call it Rock and Roll?”
The answer is …. YES you do
In that instrumental break on Josie Jim Keltner is playing a metal garbage can lid!
How I wish I could listen to this album again for the first time. On the other hand it takes many many listens to fully appreciate it.
This album needs to go up on your wall, just as good as anything up there
Don't forget to give us a rating on Peg for danceability Doug! 😂
Great stuff Doug. Listen to Steely Dan albums, From Can't Buy A Thrill to Gaucho to the early 2000's. You won't be disappointed. Also, Donald's first solo album 'The Nightfly' from 1982 is just freaking great. Nice reaction to a special band. Later..
Now you have to listen to the "lost" Aja song: "FM (No Static At All)". It was recorded during the "Aja" sessions for the movie "FM", using many of the same personnel. On RUclips look for: Steely Dan FM extended version - that's the most complete version. The video description tells the story of how that arrangement came to be. You can certainly hear the Aja stylings in FM, believe me!
Gaucho is amazing !
May I suggest diving into the NY Rock & Soul Revue - Donald Fagen with some astonishing cohorts... Phoebe Snow, Michael McDonald, Eddie Brigati, Boz Scaggs... Holy Cow, to have been there in that theater for the recording. And fer pity sake, DO "GAUCHO"!
Aja was the first album ever to cost $1M to record. S.Dan spent most of the money on multiple session players!
Hi Doug!
I Got the News is the pearl of the album!
"Broadway Duchess,
Darling, if you only knew...
Half as much as...
Everybody thinks you do."
Aja is the 2nd coolest song on the album.
But every song on this album is both memorable and sophisticated.
On guitar (which I believe it was written on by Walter mostly), the turnaround in Josie is:
| E-7 C Maj | F#7#9 B7 | E-7 C Maj | F#7#9 B7 |
| E-7 A7 | A-7 D7 | G Maj7 C Maj7 | / F#7#9 | B-7#5 ||
Then it dumps back into the E-7 Funk Riff for the verse.
But,,, As you know... that doesn't mean that those are the chords once everything else is layered.
The Bassline is fun to play.
The F#7#9 being the 'Hendrix Chord' variety Voiced F# A# E A (1, Maj 3 , -7 , #9).
I got the News is the weakest link. Outtake from Royal Scam
@@FuturePast2019 Sure, Jan
@@frankshaffer7645 Google The Weakest Link: AJA, Round 5, The Final
I think "Peg" could've been a chart-topper, if they'd just given it a more obvious name. I loved this song from the start, but it was more than a year before I realized what it was called. 🧐
I can never get tired of Bernard Purdie in Home at Last, maybe the best drum track ever recorded.
Thanks Doug this was awesome.....this is a masterpiece, for me Donald Fagen is one of the greatest musical arrangers of our time....I know Walter Becker played a part in this too but Donald was the main arranger.....the choice & placement of the instrumentation is sublime as you pointed out....I would love for you to cover more from Steely Dan as I know you would appreciate its quality....
🏝️can’t wait to see ur face when Peg hits👏🏼
Doug, I would say that Boz Scaggs "Silk Degrees" is a similar album from one year before. You need to check that out. A similar blend of jazz/pop/rock
One word to describe The Dan , SMOOTH!
Kinda odd & ironic that SD would open for the Eagles since Henley & Co. **dissed** them in the lyrics of "Hotel California"!! 😳
Donald and Walter were such perfectionists but the end results were incredible. However they did sometimes upset the session musicians; Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits travelled to the US to play on Third World Man on Gaucho and they only used 15 seconds of his quite a bit longer solo!
It’s just perfect
~20:03 It's Clydie King on backing vocals. Not "Kind". 😊
Very interesting run-through, Doug! This album and Fagen's solo debut The Nightfly are long-term favourites of mine and they're among the most confident, stylish cool-jazz-pop records of all time. Ian Dury pointed out how cinematic these songs feel, the many layers of the groove are like the shades and colours of scenes in a film. They put in a huge amount of work to get the balance and of course the choice of musicians right.
Home At Last my favorite SD tune.
“The(Bernard)Purdie Shuffle” on “Home At Last” one of the great drum beats of all time……
"I Got the News"...the pinnacle of "Cool"!