“Hey Nineteen” is the story of a rock star finding himself too old to comfortably date 19-year-olds. It was written 31 years ago. [sob 31 years!] That 19-year-old is now 50. And her daughters might be attending Dan concerts on their current tour. What does Fagen think when he sings that song?
In related news, the 64-year-old Ronnie Wood (looking every year of his age, plus mine) is seeing a 25-year-old a week after breaking up with his 29-year-old girlfriend. The 22-year-old before her broke up his marriage.
Oh, Steely Dan definitely has lyrical wit. Check out “Cousin Dupree”. It’s about a guy who propositions his cousin. She turns him down cold. (I can’t find a version on YouTube that isn’t live or a cover.) Most of their songs are very smartly written and have a depth you don’t often find in pop music.
My favorite thing about SD (and I will unabashedly admit they are, if not my all time favorite band, definitely in the top three) is that it’s about impossible to tell how old the music is. It never gets dated, and if you brought out a song of theirs that’s from 1977 (if you can find one that hasn’t been played to death on the radio) to play for someone who’s never heard the band I think they’d have an impossible time trying to pin down the era it was produced. I have a SD discography that includes Two Against Nature and Everything Must Go and if you put it on shuffle you’d never know that 30 years are spanned within the discography. Not to mention that you will listen all the way through and never find a clinker. The closest SD comes to a song I don’t like is the very few that don’t feature Fagen on vocals. Even those are pretty good. It’s definitely smart music for smart people.
It’s odd, but I think one of the things I particularly like about the debut album is the mix of vocals. I think Dirty Work with Palmer and Midnight Cruiser with Hodder work extremely well. I’m less enamored with with Palmer on Brooklyn Owes the Charmer Under Me, but then I just don’t care for that song.
But I agree that Fagen’s kinda world-weary voice really pairs well with their world-weary writing.
