Walter Becker North Hollywood, California 1989
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Walter Becker North Hollywood, California 1989 r Becker is a mysterious guy for a number of reasons. As the nonsinging be, of Becker and Fagen, the core of Steely Dan, his contributions to songs were never certain. More than a decade now since the release of ir last album, Gaucho, it's still difficult to go back over their' records and mguish Becker's ideas from Fagen's. This mystery was fortified by the fact that for many years, Steely Dan ex- only in the studio, so fans had no way of seeing Becker in action. And king at the album photos didn't help at all: Donald and Walter made a t of appearing as distant as possible by wearing shades and never smiling, ndencv that led even Rickie Lee Jones to believe that they simply weren't nice. (In fact, they were just trying to look cool, as Walter explains.) Then there are the songs. Since they met at Bard College in New York, ker and Fagen shared an enthusiasm for expanding the potential of the ng both in terms of lyrical and harmonic content. Since Donald's nasal New Irkvoice was better suited for irony than sincerity, they veered off the well- den path of introspective songwriting others were taking in the seventies to create brilliant oppositions of words and music: succinct, sardonic lyrics set to the slickest, tightest jazz a pop song could hold. They shared a passion, border- on obsession, to push the limits of what songs can do while staying within e realm of rock; they explored previously unexplored lyrical areas with a wit d literate ingenuity few others possessed at the time. And they stretched the 430 SONGWRITERS ON SONG BECKER 431 harmonic potential of the pop song (partially via the use of their "Mu chord," 'Surf and/or Die" and "Book of Liars" make it evident that Walter Becker detailed herein) without ever abandoning the visceral rhythms of rock. the goods to guide the Dan every bit as powerfully as Fagan. They also swam against the current of spontaneous, haphazard rock reo These days he makes his home over the horizon in Hawaii, though he cordings to set a new standard in terms of record productions. Disbanding their a little office in North Hollywood, and it's there that we met. He's a original lineup after the third album, they evolved to the essential core of spoken, intellectual man who was willing to discuss Steely Dan at length, Becker and Fagen only, surrounded by the brightest satellites of the rock and jazz worlds. lng us a rare perspective into the interior of one of the world's greatest Ids. Gaining a reputation as studio tyrants (which Walter dismisses as inaccu. rate), Becker and Fagen cooked up tracks that are at once burning and pris- When working in Steely Dan, you said you would sugarcoat subversive tine; hot, sizzling jazz textures with the tightest, most precise rhythmic foundations imaginable. ents in your songs. Was that a conscious aim to mask the message of songs? Steely Dan, whose name was derived from a sexual toy out of William Not so much messages, but using jazz harmonies in pop songs. At that Burroughs' Naked Lunch, started in 1972 and immediately established a sophis- e the people in the rock audience, if they were aware they were hearing tication in their songwriting starting with their first album, Can't Buy a Thrill ething that sounded like jazz, weren't too happy about it. This is something and continuing through Countdown to Ecstasy, Pretzel Logic, Katy Lied, The t Donald [Fagen] and I always had to struggle with, to incorporate some Royal Scam, and culminating with Aja, their last album of the seventies. Any. onic elements that were more sophisticated than rock and roll and still one who ever decries the lack of good music in that decade need only read that list to be silenced. Iveit sound like rock and roll. So I don't think we were deliberately trying to hide things, but we were In 1980, their last album of original material, Gaucho, was released and the . .gto combine disparate elements in a way that would make them work. So Dan was done. Fagen released Nightfiy in 1982, a solo album that had the ,e of the things we would have to do was to make these little moments of sound of Steely Dan (since it featured Donald's distinctive voice and many of onic density more palatable, integrate them well into what was going on. the same musicians) but lacked a level of darkness and irony in the lyrics, a d also there were sometimes very strange lyrics for a pop song; rather than possible clue to the Becker influence. ke the setting reflect the strangeness of the lyric, it would seem to work best He was born in New York on February 20, 1950, and knew Donald Fagen us if the setting was relatively polished and flowing. for a couple of years before they decided to become partners in 1969. Their first collaborative effort was a score for the film You Gotta Walk It Like You Talk When you began your collaboration, did you ever discuss the kinds of It starring Richard Pryor. Attempting in vain to peddle their songs around New gs you wanted to accomplish in your songs? York, they eventually landed jobs as support musicians for the band Jay And Sometimes we'd have an idea for a bizarre thing we wanted to do ,in ad- The Americans, most famous for their hit "Cara Mia Mi." They met producer nee. I think we both knew we wanted to write smart, sophisticated, witty . ds of songs. Gary Katz at the time as well as guitarist Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, and Katz used his connections at L.A.'s Dunhill Records to get them a songwriting gig. Even Was there any artist the two of you were emulating at the time? then, though, their songs proved to be too unique to sell to other artists, and Not as writers, no. Looking back, the songs that we were writing were in- Katz interceded again to get them their own record deal. Along with Skunk, uenced by the overall tenor of the times. Like everyone else, there was a Bob they enlisted guitarist Denny Dias, drummer Jim Hodder and a lead vocalist- Ian influence and there were some folky things we did, The Band was hap. David Palmer-who was eventually completely replaced as lead vocalist by pening, that kind of stuff was influential. Fagen. Their debut album, Can't Buy a Thrill was a success, fueled by the hit Jazz was always a big influence because Donald and I were both jazz fans. "Do It Again," and Steely Dan was on its way. It's surprising that you mention Dylan and The Band, whose recordings . At the time of our interview, Becker mentioned that he didn't have "the em so spontaneous compared to the precise tightness of Steely Dan. luxury to wish" he had a better singing voice, and openly contemplated record. That's something that just evolved. Coming from a time when people just ing his own solo album. "I saw how much fun Rickie had making her album," rew things together and went into the studio and let things happen, that he said of Flying Cowboys, the Rickie Lee Jones record he produced, "and I've seemed like a logical progression to us. To get some of the tightness and preci- been wanting to do it myself" ion that certain kinds of jazz had. Since then, he carried through with that promise by recording the glorious That influenced us in that kind of perfectionism ... and then, you know, 11 Tracks of Whacks, his first and only solo record, and it's shed a lot of light pure neurotic drive took over at a certain point, and we ran on that pretty well into the mystery of Walter Becker. Since Steely Dan's songs were all projected for a few years. through the Fagan persona, it was easy to assume he was the guiding spirit of Is there any way of musically explaining how you achieved that tight. their songwriting. This record proves them wrong; brilliantly inventive songs ness? Does it mostly have to do with the lock between the bass and drums? 432 SONGWRITERS ON SONGWRITING 433 Yeah, we would spend many, many hours just trying to get things to be exteriry. But whole-tone dissonances like that are quite awkward on guitar ex- rhythmically precise. And especially when you're overdubbing things, layer after cept in certain open chord positions. layer, that's very important. I would say that was a general trend in the seven- When you started using that chord, did you make a decision that it ties in record production up to and culminating in drum machines, where you would be a signature chord for Steely Dan? have absolute and utter precision, although in many cases you have absolutely We just did it so much that it ended up that way. And as time went on, no groove because it's a machine. we developed other chord alterations that became associated strongly with Back before the days of drum machines, how did you communicate what we did. And [Fagen] continues to explore the fringes of tonal organiza- your ideas to drummers? tion; harmonic stuff that still sounds tonal but is as expanded as it can be. I'm kind of a drum fteak myself so I would always have a pretty good vi- Are there other chords you can name that defined the Steely Dan sion of what I wanted.