70’s jazz rock/West Coast legends Steely Dan have always been good entertainment value during my lifetime. The duo of Walter Becker and Donald Fagen have been part of my growing up period during middle school and high school.
Written by: gdmonline
ARTIST: Steely Dan
ALBUM: Gaucho
LABEL: MCA
SERIAL: MCA-6102
YEAR: 1980
CD REISSUE: Reissue List
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: USA
LINEUP: Donald Fagen – lead vocals, synthesizer, electric piano, organ * Walter Becker – bass, guitar
Additional Musicians: Refer Wikipedia Page
TRACK LISTING: 01 Babylon Sisters * 02 Hey Nineteen * 03 Glamour Profession * 04 Gaucho * 05 Time Out Of Mind * 06 My Rival * 07 Third World Man
WEBLINKS: Site Link
Background
70’s jazz rock/West Coast legends Steely Dan have always been good entertainment value during my lifetime. The duo of Walter Becker and Donald Fagen have been part of my growing up period during middle school and high school.
Listening to tracks like ‘Rikki Don’t Lose That Number’ and ‘Reelin’ In The Years’ take me way back into time. I have all their albums, but with their seventh album ‘Gaucho’ it’s been described as perhaps the most perfect record in the jazz rock genre.
And that statement would come from serious Audiophiles out there on the Net who know a thing or two about recorded music.
I’ve read somewhere that the recording of ‘Gaucho’ was beset by personal, musical and professional difficulties. Not the least being Walter Becker’s injuries from a traffic accident, the drug overdose of his then girlfriend, and the intricacies the duo faced in getting the best possible arrangement for the seven songs.
Working with New York based session musicians proved to be a headache, as the assembled studio cats didn’t buy into the Becker and Fagen way of arranging music, which was described as borderline obsessive, and unnecessarily complicated.
The Songs
Loosely, the ‘Gaucho’ album is a series of songs based on the ‘aficionado of jazz’. They were not inter-connected, and while the music may have had some degree of charm, the lyrics were pretty much ‘out there’.
Opening with ‘Babylon Sister’, this one is a groove based tune, with brass and warm electric piano parts.
The commercial highlight is the obvious singles contender ‘Hey Nineteen’, the track about an older man dating a younger girl who is not on the same page intellectually. Check out the lyrics.
Supposedly, ‘Glamour Profession’ was a take on former NBA basketballer Magic Johnson, upon his arrival in Los Angeles to play for the Lakers. Both Becker and Fagen deny this was the case, but it’s quite prophetic how Johnson’s career would unravel in future years.
The slow jazz of the title-track ‘Gaucho’ was a belated co-write with renowned jazz pianist Keith Jarrett, who’s name wasn’t initially included on the credits, for which he threatened legal action.
‘Time Out Of My Mind’ features Dire Straits guitarist Mark Knopfler playing some solo parts which you can hear toward the end.
‘My Rival’ is a funky affair, and interestingly, made the soundtrack to the Canadian horror flick, 1980’s ‘Phobia’, featuring Paul Michael Glaser, from the TV series Starsky And Hutch.
The closing ‘Third World Man’ is reputedly about returning War Vets, and the medical and psychological impact incurred. Not quite sure how this ties in with the album’s overall theme, but musically, we hear Larry Carlton provide some input here, the song taking on a style similar to the Doobie Brothers ‘Minute By Minute’ and even some of Michael McDonald‘s solo material.
In Summary
Understandably upon its late November 1980 release, the album got to #9 in the charts, eventually going platinum, the single ‘Hey Nineteen’ reached #10 in the single charts.
This would be the duo’s last studio album for quite some time. In fact, it wouldn’t be until 2000 that Steely Dan would return, with ‘Two Against Nature’, the album released on Warner Bros subsidiary Giant Records.
Their return would see Fagen and Becker win four gongs at the 2001 Grammy Awards, including (surprisingly enough) album of the year.
Steely Dan on Video
Click to go to YTM album page.
