Rickie Lee Jones - The Horses

Was reminded of a couple examples of WB "edge" and agreed, some are straight up lyrics, characters, hard truths, juxtopositions and conflicting words and sounds but there is also the supremely formatic subtlety such as the seemingly most melodic intro to a solo featuring 8 - 12 notes followed by air and the next chorus or verse (Paging Audry, do you hear it?)! No solo comes, it's haunting and leaves you wanting more. Because, in the littlest hours that's what happens.

I can't pin the song I was listening to last night but it had the background singer(s) last line of the Chorus as the first line of the next verse which WB sings. Stuff like this happens without you even knowing it, again, suddenly you find you were lead somewhere by the ear.

Walter knew what he was doing. He planted music. It grows all around us now. RLJ

When I talk about the “edge”, I’m referring mainly to lyrics. If I can go back to the Lennon analogy again, think about the line “Couldn’t get much worse” from the song Getting Better. It injects an aspect of harsh reality to an otherwise cheery song. I think WB was really good at keeping it real, so to speak.

The edge. Imo Donald is very much interested in making the beats sound extremely balanced. Machine like. That's why the used Wendell I guess on Gaucho as well as The Nightfly. Walter seems to be interested in more raw sounding drums, or machines. On 11 Tracks his snares are very sharp sounding while Donald always uses a very much compressed snare drum. Never a big snare sound with reverb while Walter did use that on 11 Tracks. Donald tries to make chords changes very smooth, using leadtones to make the chord steps smaller and more modal sounding. Walter makes more radical chord changes, changing tonality without leading into it all the time.

Not saying there's anything is bad about this. I totally love Donald's harmonies. The only thing I would love to hear are more raw sounding drums. More Motown stuff. Keep the dynamics alive, don't try to make them sound perfect.

Short answer: Donald is looking for perfection in smoothing things out, Walter knows perfection can be exausting and in general doesn't want music to sound too smooth.

Although I can imagine both Donald and Walter thinking that they crossed that fine line when working on Gaucho. That one came out a little too smooth imo. As if they were thinking more than feeling it. Probaly looking at a screen for the first time for finding timing issues...

If I may prod you a bit more....

Here we have the heart of the question, and its difficulty; to describe what is behind placeholder words, such as "the edge". That edge is often evoked as the thing (or one of the things) that Becker brought, or contributed to SD. But what does everyone mean when they use the words that edge? What IS the "edge”? Can it be deconstructed any further into a description? Surely the word refers to some thing(s) specific. But oh so difficult to unpack and describe concretely. I have some of my own ideas...but am interested in others'.

Don’t want to demystify all those aspects of music that defy attempts to analyze them…

just a few :-)

I have to respectfully disagree with Marco with regard to Donald always sounding like Steely Dan. A good example to me is The Nightfly album. I know lots of people think that was DF's most SD-like album, but to me it was like a McCartney solo album. Some pretty melodies, great musicianship and of course the singing, but I always felt like it was missing the "interesting" parts that the music he made with his partner always had. That edge.

Continuing on with this analogy, I have always likened Becker's contribution to SD as very similar to Lennon's role with the Beatles. He brought that edge to the music that made it interesting for me to listen to. Nightfly may be my least favorite DF solo album as a result. It's too smooth, possibly. And, I have always preferred Lennon's solo stuff to McCartney's.

It was fascinating to hear D-Mod's insight into Walter consciously trying to step back from a SD sound. I can't say that I would blame him for that. He wanted his music to sound like him, not like SD, to bring his personality into the music. For that I am very grateful. Any other secret gems that D-Mod gives us in the future will only serve to strengthen that legacy.

Very interesting Moderator! :) I love this image of Walter changing the chords just to not sound like Steely Dan. What he does in Girlfriend and songs like Hat To Flat is a nifty as Steely Dan imo but totally different. Donald always sounds like Steely Dan though. Nothing wrong with it. Love his records. I just want him to make the drums sound more loose, more raw...

Hi Marco -

interesting observation. I think that issue has been at the root of most discussions about "Becker vs Steely Dan"or even "Becker vs Fagen". They are fundamentally different artists, of course, but still I imagine— and that's the right word: imagine — that I could come up with a handful of things, that can be put into words, that distinguish the two.

One of those factors is, as you say, the level of "gloss" they each prefer for their songs---or should I say, for their production. Another critical factor, I think, is simply the use of what I call "Steely Dan chords". Everybody knows about the Mu major, but there are several chords -- or more correctly, voicings of chords -- that makes something "sound like Steely Dan". It's ridiculous, really; think of all the songs that are nothing like Steely Dan in any real way, EXCEPT that they include a few of those distinctive chords...chords that are so distinctive that they are often enough, just by themselves, to leave most (casual) listeners with the "like Steely Dan" impression.

Listening to Walter’s versions across time of his solo songs is really fascinating, in all sorts of ways. One thing that surprised me greatly (that’s a huge understatement) is how in a few cases, the very first version — indeed, sometimes even while he is still mucking around on the keyboard looking for his harmonies — things start sounding ”like Steely Dan’” because of the use of those chords — especially on the bridge. Then on the very next version, or soon after, those “Steely Dan chords” are gone. It’s as though the sound of 10 years is engraved in his head, providing his default harmonic structure, and he makes a conscious decision to "subtract the Steely Dan," probably so that he could break away from a very habitual or automatic “ear” into something … different than that, and new to him.

Maybe if I can remember where I most obviously heard this effect, I’ll post the two versions. Matt, I know I played one such example for you; let’s privately discuss, and maybe I can find it again.

Others: My “difference list” is longer… these are just the first two I think of. Do you have — and can you elucidate — a list of your own, or an item you would add to any list? And I don’t mean obvious factors out of their control, like “Fagen is a better singer, Walter doesn’t sing in tune,” or things like that. I’m talking about substantive artistic sensibilities, creative choices, moments of evolution or important inflection points — based on their different “ears”.

If there is any group more able to think about this, I’d like to know who they are.

whew! maybe my longest post yet! Sorry guys, sometimes I get carried away.

I think the main difference between Don and Walter is that Don often goes beyond perfectionism. Walter's music much has more of an edge. Donald what to polish things a little bit more. I am always hoping Don to keep the drums a little more lively that the way he treads them on his solo albums. A bit like Walter did on his solo records. That smoothness, that sophistication is the Steely Dan "layer" but you can go a little too far and it gets too smooth. Doesn't need that. Keep the edge.

Great added insight to a great article and moment. Thank you.

Wow, great story D-Mod. I also love The Horses. That would have been a moment for me right there.

I always thought RLJ's remembrance of WB in Rolling Stone was one worth reading.

(PS to RS staff writer: Carnegie Hall , Beacon Theatre: some high-brow old-timey Manhattan Music Hall...same difference, right? )

Personal heartbreak scene from the '16 tour:

The magnificent Steely Dan band, working hard on a great chart (M. Leonhart's, maybe?) of "The Horses" before RLJ joined the soundcheck, whereupon they all ran down the song together, twice....never to be heard by anyone again. (In her text linked to above, she said she couldn't "hit those notes in the key change any more". Those notes sounded pretty hit to me. But...singers. It has to feel right to the singers. I believe that. I respect that. But...oh, Rickie!I I was grateful at least to hear it twice.)

This right here, was a marriage made in heaven.

beautiful, jimckay

Walter is briefly featured talking about Rickie and this album.

Great analysis jjmckay, couldn't agree more. You articulated what I've always felt about WB's contribution to Steely Dan but could never quite put my finger on.

Is this song, or more accurately the Daryl Braithwaite cover of this song, the highest charting song that either Becker or Fagen had a hand in? Or does that honor belong to some hip and/or hop track that sampled an SD song? It charted at number 1 in Australia on the 19th of May, 1991.

If you listen to China Crisis' "Flaunt the Imperfection" (preferably the two-disc version that came out last year) and then the "Flying Cowboys" abum that WB did with Rickie Lee Jones, the "11 Tracks of Whack" album is the next logical progression in the Walter Becker continuum. For some reason, I think of all three album as Walter Becker albums first--they just happen to have China Crisis and RLJ on them. Why do I think that? I think it's because just like on Steely Dan albums, Walter's prescence is both profound and oblique. Walter's that guy pulling the strings and taking things to a new level while everyone is in the conventional listener mode of focussing on the relatively literal and obvious performance of the lead vocalist and soloists. There's that quote: (sic) "You never know what's going on for sure in a Steely Dan (or WB) song, but whatever it is..." Well, it's Walter who adds that intriguing contrast of both dark and light spirituality that you know is there but can't quite put your finger on, that you can never know for sure. Walter prescense is the primary factor in why Steely Dan tracks in this extra dimension of ever-openendness of infinite meaning that transcends when Donald Fagen might give a more pat response to questions about a song's background or meaning, "This track is about so and so or such and such." Walter uniquely contributes an extra psychological/spiritual dimension of subtle insight that is found in few songs, except perhaps those by Leonard Cohen. That is what I think Donald Fagen was talking about when he recently acknowledged Walter had a unique way of writing lyrics and more. That extra dimension, realm, whatever it is you want to call it but is truely hard to describe in finite terms, is Walter's greatest gift.