Over the past weekend I was listening to Steely Dan’s Can’t Buy A Thrill album, and it staggers the imagination to think that this was their debut album. I mean, first albums are generally a band’s attempt to get things together, and one expects that things can only improve. That wasn’t the case here: Fagen and Becker got it absolutely right, the very first time. There’s not a single weak song — let alone a bad one — on the entire album.
Which would lead one to think, “Oh well, they’ll probably bring out another album or two, and things will just get worse.” Except that Steely Dan never did: every single subsequent album just got better — or maybe they didn’t, they just restated the obvious. As one commenter said: “These guys were from a superior musical universe and still are.” And Can’t By A Thrill, when compared to other albums of 1972 (!!!FFS!!!), just establishes the truth of that statement.
Which brings to mind something that annoys me about the Dan: every time I listen to one of their albums, it becomes my favorite Steely Dan album — until I listen to the next one.
We have a great deal of overlap in musical taste, but this shows the difference. I cannot abide any Steely Dan at all. They have always struck me as boring and trite with a mediocre sound at best.
It may have something to do with the fact that I used to be a musician, and in trying to play their stuff, I learned how complex it is.
It’s not the case with traditional or especially modern jazz, which has always struck me as simply noise: five guys all playing at the same time, but not necessarily together.
But I can see how SD’s jazz-inflected music might put some people off. New Wife walks out of the room when I play it, for example. (She prefers Haydn’s string concertos.)