Walter Becker, Steely Dan Co-Founder, Dead at 67

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ASPartOfMe
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03 Sep 2017, 12:00 pm

Rolling Stone

Quote:

Becker's official site announced the death; no cause of death or other details were provided
Becker missed Steely Dan's Classic East and West concerts in July as he recovered from an unspecified ailment.
Becker's doctor advised the guitarist not to leave his Maui home for the performances.

Steely Dan defined 1970's "mellow" rock and attitude

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ASS-P
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03 Sep 2017, 12:16 pm

...Lyrically, weren't the Dan rather off from the mainstream of " mellow ", even though they were musically smooth/ perhaps even classifiable as " lite "? Meaning they WEREN'T in the " mellow " mainstream - not exactly " Take it eas-ssy " or " wasting away again in Margiritaville " !

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/news ... 67-w500956]Rolling Stone[/url]

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Steely Dan defined 1970's "mellow" rock and attitude

[/quote]

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naturalplastic
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03 Sep 2017, 12:55 pm

Lyrically and musically anything but mainstream. They combined jazz with rock in a unique way that was a bit mellow in sound. But very subversive in structure.

Some not-easy-listening guitar, and some black humor lyrics in this fav of mine:

https://youtu.be/3gV1sxB8TxI

ASPartOfMe
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03 Sep 2017, 1:26 pm

There were a bunch of popular music acts in the '70's with a mellow sound whose lyrics reflected the cynicism of hippie or just youthful dreams that did not pan out. Billy Joel, Fleetwood Mac, Carly Simon, Joni Mitchell, Eagles (Hotel California).

Last edited by ASPartOfMe on 03 Sep 2017, 5:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Campin_Cat
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03 Sep 2017, 1:30 pm

ASS-P wrote:

Lyrically, weren't the Dan rather off from the mainstream of "mellow", even though they were musically smooth / perhaps even classifiable as "lite"? Meaning they WEREN'T in the "mellow" mainstream - not exactly "Take it eas-ssy" or "wasting away again in Margiritaville" !

What are you talking-about? AFAIK, Steely Dan didn't sing either of those songs (unless they covered them)----the first one was an Eagles song, IIRC; and, the second song..... I'm thinking it was Jimmy Buffet----but, I couldn't swear to it.....

******************************

In regard to the OP: This is a shame. I was a fan----"Reelin' In the Years" and "Rikki Don't Lose That Number", were two of my favs.

R.I.P.

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naturalplastic
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03 Sep 2017, 1:46 pm

Campin_Cat wrote:

ASS-P wrote:

That was his point. That the Dan did NOT do stuff that was quite the same thing as the mainstream soft rock LIKE things like "Take It Easy" (Eagles) and "margaritaville" (Buffet) of that time.

Not that I myself I am opposed to Buffet or to the Eagles either. Just that lumping them all together under the label of "mellow" is a bit misleading.

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03 Sep 2017, 4:12 pm

...I said " Not exactly ". Didn't that alone make it clear that I was saying that those two songs (And, yes, the second one cited was Jimmy Buffet.) were not songs that Dan did?

e="ASS-P"]Lyrically, weren't the Dan rather off from the mainstream of "mellow", even though they were musically smooth / perhaps even classifiable as "lite"? Meaning they WEREN'T in the "mellow" mainstream - not exactly "Take it eas-ssy" or "wasting away again in Margiritaville" ! [/quote]
What are you talking-about? AFAIK, Steely Dan didn't sing either of those songs (unless they covered them)----the first one was an Eagles song, IIRC; and, the second song..... I'm thinking it was Jimmy Buffet----but, I couldn't swear to it.....

******************************

In regard to the OP: This is a shame. I was a fan----"Reelin' In the Years" and "Rikki Don't Lose That Number", were two of my favs.

R.I.P.[/quote]