{"id":727,"date":"2017-09-04T18:18:32","date_gmt":"2017-09-05T01:18:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/?p=727"},"modified":"2017-09-04T18:18:32","modified_gmt":"2017-09-05T01:18:32","slug":"music-walter-becker-1950-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/2017\/09\/music-walter-becker-1950-2017\/","title":{"rendered":"music: RIP Walter Becker 1950\u20132017"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Another one gone. I own all the studio Steely Dan albums up to &#8220;Two Against Nature,&#8221; they&#8217;re simply masterful. A few years ago Google alerted me to a &#8220;new&#8221; Steely Dan album which turned out to be <a href=\"https:\/\/www.steelydan.com\/furry.html\">unauthorized bootlegs of their early demos<\/a> released by their scuzzy first manager. Interesting for fans, but the best part of it is you get to hear Walter Becker sing! That world-weary groan is unique and only got one lead vocal on official Steely Dan studio albums, but it led me to his solo album, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.steelydan.com\/lyrwhack.html\">11 tracks of whack (lyrics)<\/a>. It&#8217;s a modest melancholy great album. But it leaves me downcast after listening to it, so I have to pace myself, only listening to it twice a year. Then Pitchfork comes along and deservedly lists &#8220;Book of Liars&#8221; in <a href=\"https:\/\/pitchfork.com\/thepitch\/8-songs-that-show-walter-beckers-brilliance\/\">8 Songs That Show Walter Becker\u2019s Brilliance<\/a>, now I&#8217;m doubly sad.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Walter Becker, &quot;Book Of Liars&quot; (studio version)\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/E_-1BZTWdsc?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Judging by their solo albums Walter Becker was the dark cynical backgrounds to Donald Fagen&#8217;s scintillating music. As a guitarist he&#8217;s outclassed by all the studio gunslingers the Dan hired (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=waIBA6_0GQc\">\u201c6-7-8 guitarists for \u2018Peg\u2019\u201d (video)<\/a>); he&#8217;s neither a rock guitar god nor a chordal improviser like say Joe Pass, but his bluesy guitar solos towards the end of most Steely Dan songs are an essential part.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Santa Claus came in late last night<br \/>\nDrunk on Christmas wine<br \/>\nFell down hard in the driveway<br \/>\nHung his bag out on the laundry line<br \/>\n&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Stars imploding<br \/>\nThe long night passing<br \/>\nElectrons dancing in the frozen crystal dawn<br \/>\nHere&#8217;s one left stranded at the zero crossing<br \/>\nWith a hole in its half-life left to carry on<br \/>\nBut now the world&#8217;s much larger than it looks today<br \/>\nAnd if my bad luck ever blows me back this way<\/p>\n<p>Then I&#8217;ll just look in my book of liars for your name<br \/>\nI&#8217;ll just look in the book of liars for your name<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Another one gone. I own all the studio Steely Dan albums up to &#8220;Two Against Nature,&#8221; they&#8217;re simply masterful. A few years ago Google alerted me to a &#8220;new&#8221; Steely Dan album which turned out to be unauthorized bootlegs of &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/2017\/09\/music-walter-becker-1950-2017\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-727","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/727","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=727"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/727\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skierpage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}