Great band and wonderful musician. Sad and surprising news indeed...

This is very hard to take. There is no "Best of Steely Dan". All the albums are great.

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shattered
This is very hard to take. There is no "Best of Steely Dan". All the albums are great.

You are right. Every album could be my favorite.

Very saddened to hear this news. Steely Dan's classics sound every bit as fresh today as they did when they came out. Those angular banjos sure sound good to me.

Rest in peace, Walter ... we're all reeling in the years.

Drew

So sad! And Keith is still here which is amazing

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35love

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crholmstrom

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chop
RIP

Though I have to say Steely Dan produced some of the most drab, boring elevator music known to man...somehow they had a following

musicians understand how great those great those guys were (are).

I am not a musician, but I understand.
RIP

i wasn't trying to slam anyone but politely point out the ignorance of the other statement. they were an important band whose music should be with us for a long time. their whole catalog has stood up well & still sounds great today. walter becker is a big loss. i'm glad donald fagen has stated that he intends to keep the music alive as long as he can.

Walter Becker did very few interviews. From 2008
[www.timeout.com]

A few interesting (to me) bits:
About living in LA
"And its particular kinds of excesses and the fact that shallowness and superficiality and trends are so utterly, utterly powerful there is fascinating. I can never believe how much time and energy and money and talent and everything else is being poured into horrible ideas. And not even different ones—the stolen horrible ideas or stale horrible ideas or so on and so forth. It’s just a remarkable thing. And it’s very, very funny."

An interesting paragraph about having a writing and musical career with 1 partner over decades:

"Can you give a nutshell breakdown of the division of labor in Steely Dan? It’s hard for an outsider to know who’s responsible for what."

((Becker)) "Yeah, I think that with most partnerships that run for a certain amount of time—and ours has run for a pretty long time—the division of labor is very ad hoc. So whatever needs to be done, sometimes I’ve got something to start with, sometimes Donald’s got something to start with. Sometimes we really work very closely, collaboratively on every little silly millimeter on the writing of the song and certainly of the records, and sometimes less so. And so over the course of the partnership, I think we’ve done all sorts of different things different ways, and probably that still is changing in a way, because if I can speculate on Donald’s behalf, I think there is a level of perfection, polish, sophistication, and abundance of detail and structural stuff that he wants to hear in his music that I sort of ran out of patience to do. My attention span is not that good anymore, and I sort of believe—and maybe the lyrics somewhere say this—that the perfect is the enemy of the good. And one of the real dangers of doing the kind of thing that we do, where people let you do whatever you want and you have money, is burnout. You go too far; there’s no one there to stop you; you keep going; you keep working on things. So I have to learn, and even sort of create artificial boundaries so that doesn’t happen. And nowadays because of computers, because of a variety of things, there’s an unlimited palette of techniques that you can use. And if you don’t rule certain things in and certain things out—put it this way, it’s helpful for me. I tried to think back to what we did in the ’70s with what we had available, and why in some ways that was an optimum sort of setup. So there’s something, for example, about the fact that either you get a track that day with your band, or everybody goes home with their dick in the dirt, that helps you get tracks. It helps for musicians to know that it’s either going to happen there and they’re going to know about it and be on the record, or not. And not that they’re going to play some stuff and you’re going to take it home and fiddle with it and fool around with it. I like to get as much as I can in the tracking session. If I had the resources and the time and the fixed cast of characters and a bunch of other things, I would try to record everything live. If I could sing well enough, especially. But with other people too, I just think that ultimately that’s something I aspire to, because it’s the most joyous experience in music-making, when everybody’s playing together."



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2017-09-04 16:26 by 35love.

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SomeTorontoGirl
I think the last time was 2 years ago in Michigan on a double bill with Elvis Costello - an excellent evening.

I was at that show. The Ticketmaster gods smiled upon me and I somehow managed to score front row seats at the very last minute. The only time I ever saw them, despite being a huge fan.

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shattered
There is no "Best of Steely Dan". All the albums are great.

Very true. They maintained such high standards of quality, that you could compile a legitimate "best of" using almost any two tracks selected at random from each of their first seven albums.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2017-09-04 16:39 by tatters.

Dave Hlubeck of Molly Hatchet died yesterday, too. A year younger than Walter.

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35love
An interesting paragraph about having a writing and musical career with 1 partner over decades:

"Can you give a nutshell breakdown of the division of labor in Steely Dan? It’s hard for an outsider to know who’s responsible for what."

((Becker)) "Yeah, I think that with most partnerships that run for a certain amount of time—and ours has run for a pretty long time—the division of labor is very ad hoc. So whatever needs to be done, sometimes I’ve got something to start with, sometimes Donald’s got something to start with. Sometimes we really work very closely, collaboratively on every little silly millimeter on the writing of the song and certainly of the records, and sometimes less so. And so over the course of the partnership, I think we’ve done all sorts of different things different ways, and probably that still is changing in a way, because if I can speculate on Donald’s behalf, I think there is a level of perfection, polish, sophistication, and abundance of detail and structural stuff that he wants to hear in his music that I sort of ran out of patience to do. My attention span is not that good anymore, and I sort of believe—and maybe the lyrics somewhere say this—that the perfect is the enemy of the good. And one of the real dangers of doing the kind of thing that we do, where people let you do whatever you want and you have money, is burnout. You go too far; there’s no one there to stop you; you keep going; you keep working on things. So I have to learn, and even sort of create artificial boundaries so that doesn’t happen. And nowadays because of computers, because of a variety of things, there’s an unlimited palette of techniques that you can use. And if you don’t rule certain things in and certain things out—put it this way, it’s helpful for me. I tried to think back to what we did in the ’70s with what we had available, and why in some ways that was an optimum sort of setup. So there’s something, for example, about the fact that either you get a track that day with your band, or everybody goes home with their dick in the dirt, that helps you get tracks. It helps for musicians to know that it’s either going to happen there and they’re going to know about it and be on the record, or not. And not that they’re going to play some stuff and you’re going to take it home and fiddle with it and fool around with it. I like to get as much as I can in the tracking session. If I had the resources and the time and the fixed cast of characters and a bunch of other things, I would try to record everything live. If I could sing well enough, especially. But with other people too, I just think that ultimately that’s something I aspire to, because it’s the most joyous experience in music-making, when everybody’s playing together."

Wow, that's fascinating, and very illustrative of some of our endless speculating about not only who-does-what in the Stones but also how the saga of The Supposed Album: or We Hit the Wall and the Wall Won has unspooled over the past few years. Turns out, maybe deadlines are a good thing!

RIP Walter. Glad a got to see Steely Dan a couple of years ago...

Rob Sheffield just published a piece in RS magazine
[www.rollingstone.com]

((a paragraph from ^))
The better times didn't come. Becker crashed out, drifted away during the making of Gaucho, lost touch with Fagen, retreated to Hawaii to deal with his addictions, or as he called them, "social ills." They went years without seeing each other. Back in New York, Fagen would go to jazz clubs, ask the musicians to autograph napkins "To Walter" and drop them in the mail to his long-lost friend. "Just to keep him going. Or so I thought." They made solo albums where they got direct – sentimental, even – in ways they couldn't together. Becker's wonderfully sardonic 1994 album 11 Tracks of Whack had a confession called "This Moody Bastard" ("needs some kind of friend now and then"). When they revived Steely Dan, they found their audience more passionate than ever – and they couldn't quite hide their delighted (if bemused) surprise that the audience was there.

Another from RS magazine, Ms. Jones, who was also close:

[www.rollingstone.com]

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crholmstrom
Dave Hlubeck of Molly Hatchet died yesterday, too. A year younger than Walter.

Another great one. They toured Germany either this year or last. Thank you for mentioning.

Played a lot of Steely Dan
'My Old School' 1973
[youtu.be]

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shattered

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crholmstrom
Dave Hlubeck of Molly Hatchet died yesterday, too. A year younger than Walter.

Another great one. They toured Germany either this year or last. Thank you for mentioning.

Yes sad, he was a great guitar player. A friend and I saw them live in 1979 when we were in High school - there were a couple of good tracks on the Flirting with Disaster album. But I remember my older brother dismissing them as poor mans Allman Brothers or Lynyrd Skynyrd - in hindsight he may have been right but at the time I thought it was a jackass statement.

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Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......

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Hairball

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shattered

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crholmstrom
Dave Hlubeck of Molly Hatchet died yesterday, too. A year younger than Walter.

Another great one. They toured Germany either this year or last. Thank you for mentioning.

Yes sad, he was a great guitar player. A friend and I saw them live in 1979 when we were in High school - there were a couple of good tracks on the Flirting with Disaster album. But I remember my older brother dismissing them as poor mans Allman Brothers or Lynyrd Skynyrd - in hindsight he may have been right but at the time I thought it was a jackass statement.

This is getting OT. Hairball, I saw em twice, and in '79 we saw em on the same tour. Southern Rock (correction "Swamp-Rock"). Didn't they open for the Stones? I tried to find the interview and couldn't. [www.youtube.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2017-09-05 06:24 by shattered.

It seems the 'Act' known as Steely Dan is going to continue. Seems strange, both of them have had solo careers after all.
Any views on this?

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jlowe
It seems the 'Act' known as Steely Dan is going to continue. Seems strange, both of them have had solo careers after all.
Any views on this?

Is fine. Donald wants to continue the legacy. They have put together a red hot back up band over the years. I'm wondering if Larry Carlton will play more with them now. Donald still has his solo thing, too. Different musicians.

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jlowe
It seems the 'Act' known as Steely Dan is going to continue. Seems strange, both of them have had solo careers after all.
Any views on this?

He probably just figures he'll sell more tickets as Steely Dan than he would as Donald Fagen. To the majority of the not-too-well-informed music-buying public, he is Steely Dan, just as surely as Ian Anderson is Jethro Tull. Not much difference between a Steely Dan show and a Donald Fagen solo gig anyway, except maybe the setlist, and I think even that's not been the case lately, with Fagen playing more and more SD numbers at his solo concerts.

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jlowe
It seems the 'Act' known as Steely Dan is going to continue. Seems strange, both of them have had solo careers after all.
Any views on this?

Yes. It's been a long assss career. Retire.

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35love

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jlowe
It seems the 'Act' known as Steely Dan is going to continue. Seems strange, both of them have had solo careers after all.
Any views on this?

Yes. It's been a long assss career. Retire.

IMHO, all long-lived bands who cannot produce compelling new music and are reduced to touring their greatest-hits decade after decade ought to consider retirement.

I love the smell of irony in the morning.

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SomeTorontoGirl
I love the smell of irony in the morning.

Smells like ... victory!

His life long partner died.

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35love
His life long partner died.

Steely Dan are managed by Eagles' manager Irving Azoff. It's the same mentality that has Azoff pushing out the Eagles on tour after a co-founder died. They may feel justified due to the fact that streaming has destroyed the revenue from back catalog sales, so the ability to make money off touring is the only way they can make up that revenue reduction. It still seems insensitive for both Becker and Henley to be doing it, and that can't be blamed on Azoff.

Didn't realize this, but evidently Walter Becker was sick during both the recent Classic East and West concerts last month and wasn't at either of them.
Yet the band played on...

From Billboard review of Classic East concert CLASSIC EAST

"One song into their expert 13-song set, Steely Dan frontman Donald Fagen addressed the absence of the band's guitarist and co-founder, Walter Becker, who also missed Classic West, both with illness...Steely Dan's set was marvelous -- energetic, proficient and predictably virtuosic, with solos zooming from every direction, courtesy of trombones, melodicas, drums and most instruments in between. The band played at least one song from each of their seven original studio albums..."


As for the Eagles new members:

"Of course the band already has two solo stars in Don Henley and Joe Walsh, and they've added a third in country legend Vince Gill -- who also helped fill in for Glenn Frey at Classic West, and who the band introduced on Saturday as "one of the best singer-songwriters and guitarists this country has ever produced." But...all eyes were most squarely on young Deacon, a positively eerie dead-ringer for his younger pops (with perhaps a touch of Eli Manning thrown in), who seemed humbled, but not overwhelmed by the opportunity to step into dad's shoes in front of many thousands of long-time fans. He handled it like a pro, and he sounded awesome. As the band serpentined through their classics, you really got a sense of just how many things they did well... And with Deacon and possibly Gill in tow, there's no real reason the group shouldn't be able to continue on: The band sounds about as on-point as ever, and festivals like Desert Trip and Classic East/West are proving there's still a market for headliners of the Eagles' age and stature.

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Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......

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LongBeachArena72

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35love

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jlowe
It seems the 'Act' known as Steely Dan is going to continue. Seems strange, both of them have had solo careers after all.
Any views on this?

Yes. It's been a long assss career. Retire.

IMHO, all long-lived bands who cannot produce compelling new music and are reduced to touring their greatest-hits decade after decade ought to consider retirement.

Uum....would you apply this viewpoint to solo Acts also?
So, for example, Steve Winwood, subject of a current thread hasn't produced a new album for 9 years.
Chuck Berry should have said farewell 25 years ago?
ETC !

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35love

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jlowe
It seems the 'Act' known as Steely Dan is going to continue. Seems strange, both of them have had solo careers after all.
Any views on this?

Yes. It's been a long assss career. Retire.

What for? They sold out the Shea's Buffalo two weeks ago in minutes.