The Very Best of Steely Dan

by Steely Dan

Overview

Putting together a "best-of" compilation for a band as hell-bent on achieving perfection as Steely Dan can be a daunting task. Fortunately, The Very Best of Steely Dan takes a kitchen-sink approach as it delivers two discs of remarkably precise jazz-rock from the storied outfit. A career retrospective, the album tracks Steely Dan from their more group-oriented beginning, which found legendary guitarist Jeff "Skunk" Baxter in the lineup, to their more withdrawn period in the second half of their career when Becker and Fagen focused on the perfectionism allowed by the studio environment. This helps to give listeners a taste of the band's complete history all in one shot rather than over the course of a couple of volumes. In the end, The Very Best of Steely Dan is like the closing arguments of two attorneys who are both arguing their client is innocent, just for different reasons, with both of its two discs making a compelling case for why Steely Dan were one of the great soft/jazz-rock bands of the '70s. ~ Gregory Heaney

Product Details

Release Date:	07/07/2009
Label:	Universal Distribution / Universal Music Tv
UPC:	0600753204511
Rank:	1572

Tracks

Disc 1

1. Do It Again
2. Dirty Work
3. Reelin' in the Years
4. Only a Fool Would Say That
5. Change of the Guard
6. Bodhisattva
7. The Boston Rag
8. Show Biz Kids
9. My Old School
10. Rikki Don't Lose That Number
11. Night by Night
12. Pretzel Logic
13. Any Major Dude Will Tell You
14. Black Friday
15. Bad Sneakers
16. Doctor Wu
17. Any World (That I'm Welcome To)
18. Chain Lightning

Disc 2

19. Kid Charlemagne
20. Don't Take Me Alive
21. Haitian Divorce
22. The Fez
23. Here in the Western World
24. Black Cow
25. Aja
26. Deacon Blues
27. Peg
28. Josie
29. FM
30. Babylon Sisters
31. Hey Nineteen
32. Time Out of Mind
33. Third World Man

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Steely Dan   Primary Artist
Steve Gadd   Primary Artist
Steve Kahn   Primary Artist
Victor Feldman   Primary Artist
Tom Scott   Primary Artist,Conductor
Mark Knopfler   Primary Artist
Chuck Rainey   Primary Artist
David Sanborn   Primary Artist
Wayne Shorter   Primary Artist
Rick Derringer   Primary Artist
Randy Brecker   Primary Artist
Rick Marotta   Primary Artist
Michael Brecker   Primary Artist

Technical Credits

Walter Becker   Composer
Gary Katz   Producer
Donald Fagen   Composer
Paul Laurence Griffin   Composer