Citizen Steely Dan [Box] - Steely Dan (CD 1993)

First coming together in the late 1960s and united by a shared interest in jazz and Dylan lyrics, Donald Fagen and Walter Becker, as Steely Dan, made some of the most popular music of the 1970s, to reaction ranging from adoration to hatred from the music business - who saw them either as overproduced and slick or a hyper-intelligent craftsmen.

There can be no doubt to my ears that, at their best, Steely Dan produced some of the most literate and intelligent pop music that has ever been made. The combination of jazzy arrangements and Fagen's brilliant lyrical skill that turned storytelling into an art form like few other songwriters (Paddy McAloon in the late 1980s) could even come close to matching. Moreover, their music, rather than being overproduced, was, at least on their earliest albums, quite sparsely, even leanly, produced and consequently has stood up to time remarkably well - much better indeed than many of Steely Dan's flashier contemporaries.

Citizen Steely Dan, released in 1993, was an attempt to compile all of Steely Dan's recordings over the period from 1972, when "Do It Again" came out, to 1981 when Fagen and Becker disbanded after the release of Gaucho, which was panned by many critics who had praised their earlier work. The whole set, covering four full CDs, compiles all their studio albums from Can't Buy A Thrill and Countdown To Ecstasy in 1972/1973 to Aja in 1977 and Gaucho in the early 1980s.

The first CD covers Steely Dan s first two albums, which set a standard that Fagen and Becker would struggle to keep up for the rest of their career. "Do It Again", with its hypnotic rhythm and sitar, along with Fagen's typically funny, yet remarkably literate, lyrics, stands as one of the absolute masterpieces of the era. Even experimental bands could not maintain a groove so well as the Dan manage there. Whilst nothing among the other nine songs on Can't Buy A Thrill matches this amazing opening, there are still some exceptional songs. "Kings", "Fire In The Hole" and "Brooklyn Owes The Charmer Under Me" especially stand out with Fagen's amazing sense of humour, and the guitar break on "Reeling In The Years" undoubtedly lives up to its reputation. The last six tracks on the first CD come from their second album, 1973's Countdown To Ecstasy, which was their only serious commercial failure but musically and lyrically maintained the sky-high standard of Can't Buy A Thrill. "Bodhisattva" perfectly fit the times with its theme of Eastern religion, whilst "Show Biz Kids" showed Fagen and Becker apparently tackling social issues (the treatment of people in show business) with the guile and virtuosity of hardened veterans. "Your Gold Teeth" and the gospel-inflected "The Boston Rag" showed no band could make music truly funny and serious at the same time like Fagen did. His wordplay managed to use the most surprising yet perfectly effective words in a way nobody in popular music ever had before. The sparse, beautiful "Razor Boy" possesses a lyric whose dark tone (about the risk of being robbed) Fagen and Becker conceal to near-perfect effect, whilst "My Old School" possesses an explosive guitar break that the Dan would never equal.

Disc Two begins with the last two songs from Countdown To Ecstasy, and the first, "King of the World" is as brilliant an opener as "Do It Again": a seemingly spontaneous, free-flowing, upbeat and energetic tune that is actually apocalyptic in its vision of a future catastrophe ("any man left on the Rio Grande/is the king of the world as far as I know" must stand as the greatest example of doom prophecy in music). Whilst "Pearl of the Quarter" very marginally weakens a masterful first pair of albums, with "Rikki Don't Lose That Number" and the steamy overlooked gem "Night by Night" from their third album Pretzel Logic Steely Dan rebounded. Whilst Pretzel Logic does not on the whole quite equal their first two masterpieces as some songs seem a fraction slight, "Through With Buzz" and "With A Gun" show Steely Dan broaden their horizon (piano-based and acoustic respectively) to considerable effect. The live version of "Bodhisattva" is unfortunately spoiled by excessive crowd noise, but the remaining songs on Disc Two (from 1975's Katy Lied) show Fagen writing some remarkable lyrics. Notable in this respect is "Black Friday" (whose guitar and piano lines were emulated by Tori Amos' on "God" to remarkable effect) and whose lyrics are as remarkable as those on "King of the World" for their seemingly frightening visions. Indeed, the whole of Katy Lied has this dark tone in its lyrics.

The third disc, which is the one I have listened to least since buying Citizen Steely Dan, nonetheless does not disappoint whenever it is played. Apart from the first three and last four tracks, all of the material is taken from their 1976 album The Royal Scam. Fagen's lyrical mood here is wittier ever - witness "Haitian Divorce" and "The Caves of Altamira" which show Fagen delving deep into humanity's past. The vocals on "Kid Charlemagne" stand as strangely beautiful despite the song's upbeat rhythm. Indeed, if you listen carefully to so many of their greatest songs from "Show Biz Kids" right up to their last great song "Glamour Profession", one sees how often Steely Dan could develop quite unique atmosphere within their music. This is seen to a contrasting effect on "The Royal Scam" itself, about the problems faced by immigrants from Puerto Rico, where fiery, but bare guitar lines contrast with soft piano rhythms in a quite dramatic way. The last three tracks on this disc come from the often-acclaimed Aja, which is really their weakest album and generally lacked the appealling wit, edge and directness so evident on their first five albums.

The fourth disc begins with the second side of Aja which, although it includes that album's strongest (though perhaps least-known) track "I Got the News" with its dramatic chorus, still does not compare favourably with the Dan's greatest music. The 1978 hit single "FM (No Static At All)" with a celebratory mood so different from what made Steely Dan great in the first place, still stands up well - perhaps because Fagen and Becker played all the instruments apart from Jeff Porcaro on drums. The remainder of the last disc comes from the oft-discredited 1980 swansong Gaucho. On the strength of "Hey Nineteen" and "Glamour Profession" which capture Fagen and Becker at their best lyrically and musically just as they were separating, Gaucho is really somewhat stronger than Aja, but the rest of Gaucho again is below par by the Dan's sky-high standards.

Whilst collectors may complain that there is almost no rare or unreleased material on Citizen Steely Dan, they are basically missing the point of this box set: to compile one of the most impressive canons in the popular music world. Whereas other Steely Dan compilations miss so many essential tracks ("King of the World", for one, cannot be found on any single-disc compilation), here we see all the original Dan studio albums in their original running order - and that ought to be enough to gain an unqualified recommendation for any music fan.