Everybody's reacting to Steely Dan today. Nice !

"I'm a ....bookeeper's son...." best hits into a chorus ever. Still floors me after nearly fifty years of checking in on this most fabulous album.

First song that enters my mind whenever someone asks my favorite SD song… then my mind gets overwhelmed with the second wave. Top tier for me. Thanks for this reaction!

@oboogie2

4 ай бұрын

Totally agree as for favorite SD song...until I listen to the next SD song...and then the next one after that...and so on.

Larry Carlton on fire here, as he was so often for the Dan. Banging tune, so much tasty harmony.

So many Steely Dan songs stick in your mind, but this one just bores in and stays. After a few listens it's one you'll never forget.

Love this song, Love, love, love this album………….All the right notes in the exact right order.

Love that intro chord and solo. Larry does it again. The Dan is top notch. I have heard some suggest that the lyrics are loosely based on the Sterling Hall bombing in 1970 at the University Wisconsin-Madison. The reason for the attack was revenge for the Kent State shootings. One of the bombers, David Fine, had a father that was an accountant in Oregon and the one person killed was the “ luckless pedestrian” who went to the building to check on an experiment when the bomb went off. Fine was taken alive 6 yrs later. Sounds plausible.

Best intro guitar solo EVAH!

@mjm5081

4 ай бұрын

​@@leonmattigosh2525🏆

Even with a 'Skunk' in the group they never stink! Peace & Love.

This is one of the greatest songs ever. Larry Carltons Guitar is enough but the lyrics and vocal delivery by Fagen and then the rest of the cast elevate this to the heights very few songs could ever achieve.

Best band ever.

You said "It doesn't get old". That really sums up what is so unusual about this band and this music that incredibly was made almost 50 years ago. I can't say why exactly "it doesn't get old", but that's the just the way it is. This is a great album.

Even by their stratospheric standards this is remarkable.

@JustJP

4 ай бұрын

For sure!

Nice! That is how you react to Steely Dan! You just can’t help but get lost in it.

@JustJP

4 ай бұрын

Lost in the Steely sauce🍜

It's what's called a Bolivian Army ending. The protagonist is facing insurmountable odds, and the story leaves us before the resolution. So we can let our minds fill in the blanks as to how it truly ends. One of my favorite SD songs, for sure. I remember being blown away (no pun intended) when I first heard this song as a kid, and have to stop and listen whenever it shows up. Thank you for reviewing it!

Great memorable straightforward rock tune from the Dan love it and wow who opens with a 40 second solo 😂

Back in the mid 70's when I was 13 or 14 I had heard Rikki Don't Lose That Number and Do it Again when I heard Aja at my brothers place. Really liked it and my brother hands me his Steely Dan collection and said go home and listen to it. Became a fan for life. I still sometimes have a Dan party on the weekend.

Awesome band! Amazing song! Just for that intro alone.

You can’t ask for more. Dan DELIVERS!

Steely Dan, your favorite bands favorite band 🔥✌🤘!!

One of my favourites a masterpiece of a track. The Fez, Green Earnings, Haitian Divorce and the Title track are fucking amazing tracks.

@sourisvoleur4854

4 ай бұрын

I'll add my vote for Haitian Divorce.

@keithjones7390

4 ай бұрын

Caves of Altamira is one of my favourites.

@manhattenman6075

4 ай бұрын

@@keithjones7390 he’s already done it and that’s a banger too

Steely Dan ? Fantastic . I heard them since 1983

My fave Dan album 🏆

@keithjones7390

4 ай бұрын

My second favourite after Pretzel Logic

@mjm5081

4 ай бұрын

@@keithjones7390 😃 👍 👊

Suicide by cop never sounded so cool. Just LOVE Larry Carlton's guitar on this song!

A perfect song. Love the band, love the album, love the channel. Steely Dan and XTC are my two favorite bands, they never tired me, never get old.

They are so smooth they are frictionless.

@JustJP

4 ай бұрын

Frictionless indeed papalaz!

I just saw SD with the Eagles and it was just incredible!

Superb

Wait til you get to title track! 🔥🎆

It’s Been Awhile Since I’ve Heard This Song ! Great Song 🎧 Great Choice Song JP !!!!!! I don’t know if you have done a reaction to (Babylon Sisters) yet by them or not which would be another Great Song to do your own reaction on ! 👍👍👍

Another classic. You must have access to my playlist. 😅. Thank you for the review. ☺️

@JustJP

4 ай бұрын

Hahaha :D Ty Ker

@Ker-mk3bf

4 ай бұрын

​@@JustJP Enjoy the upcoming week. 😊

@JustJP

4 ай бұрын

@@Ker-mk3bf you as well!

brilliant

This is my favorite SD album. You should check out every song that you haven’t already heard.

Second favourite Steely Dan album after Pretzel Logic. OK maybe those two albums lacked the 'polished and sophisticated' finish of Aja, but in a way l prefer the earlier work on their wonderful albums. Caves of Altamira and the title track two favourites on The Royal Scam.

Great bluesy rock song. Kind of a Boz Scaggs feel (or vice versa). But if his old man lived in Oregon, you'd think he'd know how to pronounce it.

that 3/4 time downward arpeggio chorus you note, with the drum line, sounds like Chris Cross's Ride Like The Wind

@Coowallsky

Ай бұрын

Wonder if Cross was aware of that when he wrote it.

Perfect tune! SD always makes a day better!

A great one from my fav SD album. Have you reacted to Royal Scam's title track yet JP?

A superb, and mellifluous track off my fave 'Dan' LP. Not a note out of place.

Excellent!

Thanks for being there.

@JustJP

4 ай бұрын

Thank YOU

"The Royal Scam" is my favourite Steely Dan album by far. I know that "Aja" is generally considered their masterpiece, but it's just a bit too smooth and polished for me, I prefer the the dark, funky grittiness of the earlier album, not a bad track on it

Excellent song and album!

Hey man, love your reactions, you are a really nice guy. You do play it safe though. I’d love to hear your reactions to the Church, a band who in a hundred years will be like Nick Drake, unappreciated in their heyday. No one has really reacted to Priest=Aura, their still born 1992 release. Better than any album released that year. The Church are a band where if you hear one song you say, cool. Three tracks and you go “oh yeah”!!😂 Thanks for your virtual friendship, I enjoy your company on a Scottish winter night.

@Altres

4 ай бұрын

Also some Can, Future Days, Tago Mago or Ege Bamyasi. Popol Vuh, Hosianna Mantra. Joni Mitchell, Cactus Tree. First Neu! album. Sorry, I’m an old Krautrock fan. 😂

@davidheiser2225

4 ай бұрын

I don't think he plays it safe, as you say. Far from it. He listens to far more obscure things than The Church. Priest=Aura is a great album but I don't think it was overlooked. "Under the Milky Way" was in heavy rotation on MTV, after all.

@JustJP

4 ай бұрын

Thanks for watching Altres! You'll find several reactions to some of the artists/albums you're mentioned on the channel :) Enjoy!

@Altres

4 ай бұрын

@@JustJP Thanks, I do enjoy your reactions. Must dip deeper. ✌️

@Altres

3 ай бұрын

@@davidheiser2225 I was meaning just doing Steely Dan, which virtually everyone does. Ok, I was wrong, looked further/deeper into the channel and he has featured some really quixotic and mercurial artists 🤩

like so many SD tunes, jammin yet smooooth

@JustJP

4 ай бұрын

They've got the potion down🧴

Powerful song, the father and son building dynamic mirrors a lot of families minus the final outcome hopefully. Sometimes it goes too far hence, on the road again scenario. Kid Charlemagne is often said to have thee finest guitar solo in rock music, I disagree. DTMA is it for me. It just continues through the song pushing and giving brilliance. When you think there can’t be anymore, there is.

Did you get my request and donation?

As always with SD for me, the guitar is top drawer, the band is good but I prefer Santana for this kind of groove, the song is OK but doesn't grab me ( it sounds like a chord progression in search of a melody rather than the other way round) and while this is certainly one of Fagen's better efforts, it still doesn't convert me to his voice.

This is arguably Steely Dan's most underrated album. Why? Well, I'm not exactly sure because the music is some of their most sophisticated, and Larry Carlton truly shines on every song he's on. So I can only guess it's because the album cover is probably their worst. People judge a book by the cover...

@KingOfNebbishes

4 ай бұрын

Probably had more to do with the lackluster promotion of the album, really, capped by releasing The Fez as the second single. Even then, it still peaked at #15 in the US.

@illegal_space_alien

4 ай бұрын

@@KingOfNebbishes I imagine the only reason this wasn't a single was because the subject matter scared the execs away from it.

@mjm5081

4 ай бұрын

My fave 🏆

One of their best, I cypher. For a far less risible and insouciant take on the matter you might find Harry Chapin's "Sniper" and Elton John's "Ticking" to be thought-provoking, and redolent with rare profundity.

@davidheiser2225

4 ай бұрын

Or, for a more ghastly and graphic romp through the tortured human psyche, there's Nick Cave's "O'Malley's Bar".

@MisterWondrous

4 ай бұрын

@@davidheiser2225 I'll check that out. Loved him in "Wings of Desire".

This album...better than Aja. There. I said it.

@keithjones7390

4 ай бұрын

I've been saying exactly the same thing for years. Aja is an absolutely amazing album no question, but so many bands for me recorded their best stuff on their earlier albums, Steely Dan included. The Royal Scam isn't exactly an early album but I consider it up there with their very best work.

@mjm5081

4 ай бұрын

I love Aja But The Royal Scam is my fave 🏆

Why not just forget the Queen album Dustin. It's obviously not worth the effort! 🍋

@PogueMahone1

4 ай бұрын

Not as long as there's still unheard Dan on his plate!

@jimhardiman3836

4 ай бұрын

The Baron of Originality strikes again! 🤡🤡🤡 Absolutely brilliant, original, insightful commentary on a Steely Dan track by a truly original musicological visionary. Bravissimo! A+++ 👏👏👏