Steely Dan: "Steely Dan's name has been popping up as a hip musical crush. Remember, this glossy bop-pop was the indifferent aristocracy to punk rock's stone-throwing in the late 70's. People fought

haha - yes Dan you are TOO SMART FOR US MORANS.

Okay, you really need to see the DVD about the making of Aja where they play all of the competing solos for "Peg" before playing the one that was actually chosen.

Even with that aside, claiming this about Steely Dan in a world that contains Yngwie Malmsteen, Joe Satriani, and really the entire genres of heavy and black metal strikes me as being very... skillphobic.

That's only because you never review your own comments.

"On a basic level, I don't think that people who dislike Steely Dan actually give a shit about or understand music."

My new wanking technique is unstoppable!

"Not sure this is necessarily a bad thing. Even kind of clever, if you think about it."

It's not, necessarily. It just means that I'll still choose 10cc whenever I want studio polish. I can respect the technique required to paint pictures onto rice grains at kiosks in pedestrian malls, but that doesn't mean I necessarily think that the end result is all that worth spending money on.

Jaymc: my dad (also an ILMer) What?

His name is also Jay. (He goes by J. Arthur Rank around here. You'll see him in the Jazz Douchebag threads).

"But, Dan, the Sex Pistols DESTROYED all that corporate-rock shite and brought REALITY back to music!"

More than that, I think Nevermind the Bollocks is a really good rock album. I don't have so much of a hardon for the idea of the Pistols, but the music's pretty damn good and has held up pretty well.

"yeah, bob james was no slouch. go find another tv theme to pick on."

Nah, fuck that. The theme to Taxi just makes me want to get off the elevator and take the stairs. Though I can understand the love for him coming from stone-cold Steely Dan fans.

"but so are the sex pistol. the worst thing abt. steely dan debates is that sometimes two things i love get pitted as mortal enemies or something. it's weird...."

I only mentioned 'em because they'd been brought up before and Bollocks was directly compared to Aja upthread. I like the Sex Pistols far much more than I dislike Aja.

I guess the biggest recurring thought I had listening to Aja was that it would be an absolutely fantastic album to have dental surgery to. Soothing, interesting enough to focus on in points, and overall anesthetic.

But I'll keep my eyes open for other earlier albums and keep an open mind.

To be fair, though, that "argument" isn't so terribly far beyond the pale, in my experience. For some people, expressing distaste towards Steely Dan isn't terribly unlike throwing shit at their kids.

never mind the bollocks is a great rock record though.

I think we have more in common than SD, john. In lots of cases it's a question of degrees (for example, Dan enjoys Depeche Mode more than I do, but I do like quite a lot of their stuff).

Also js, the only thing I'm getting from your posts is that if we were in the same room trying to decide on music to play on the stereo, we would kill each other.

(xpost: Susan is so OTM, you don't really need to privilege the lyrics at all to think SD are wonderful.)

On the other hand, the idea that prefering Steely Dan to the Sex Pistols is just a case of contrarianism is ridiculous.

Word.

Heh. We've agreed before, and we'll agree again. I'm just not wild about the Dan, Dan.

Yeah, no, I don't think you and Dan are polar opposites. But I don't see you and, say, Ian listening to the same stuff. And I don't see Dan and Hstencil having a whole lot in common. I just sorta threw that list together willy-nilly. You can also toss Ethan in there, too.

Explain please why one would enjoy solo Fagan yet be offended by Steely Dan?

There have been other types of defenses given before, however (on other threads). My point was more that the punk vs. SD or the "but they are just coke-addled smooth jazz cynics" problem some people seem to have doesn't exist for me, and it's no stretch at all for me to like at least a lot of their songs. I liked them when I was a kid, so there must have been some non-nostalgic reason (and I didn't automatically like every single song I heard on the beach or on the car radio on the way home, but that did heighten the experience of hearing songs sometimes).

A lot of their songs are just crazily hooky, melodically great, and that sort of thing.

Word to that.

Geir?

:-)

x-post:

Maybe there would have been a brief period of time when I would have been embarrassed to like them, but I don't think I paid any attention to them during that phase of my life.