I pretty much got up to speed with all of Steely Dan's albums while at university, yet this, their final album before a 20 year album hiatus, passed me by until much later, when I picked it up cheap on cassette.
Looking at the state of the CD insert, this one was probably a quid at a bootfair.
By now, Steely Dan was well established as being just Donald Fagen and Walter Becker, and a selection of the finest session musicians and guests they could get. By all accounts, it was a difficult album, taking two years, during which Becker suffered serious injury when hit by a car, needing six months to recover, possibly related to his own drug use, as well as his girlfriend dying of a drug overdose, and questions asked about his culpability. They were also trying to follow 1977's masterpiece and zillion seller Aja, so expectations were high, and reactions to Gaucho mixed.
Opening with the smooth jazz Babylon Sisters, the mood is set for laid back, jazz-infused rock with the lyrics reflecting the California hipster lifestyle. Hey Nineteen is a little more upbeat, ambiguous about whether the "Cuevo gold and fine Columbian, make tonight a wonderful thing" for the aging lothario (Fagen was 32 at this point) alone or with the young subject of the song. For me, these two tracks are the album's highlight, the rest of the album sounding wonderful but not really feeling like Dan classics. Glamour Profession schmoozes through more California hipster life, Gaucho continues that theme, a little slower, having lifted its opening section from Keith Jarrett (uncredited on this release) and Time Out Of Mind funks things up a bit. My Rival feels like the band are going through the motions, although a fantastic horn section in the middle with a guitar solo by Steve Khan recues it, and final track Third World Man brings proceedings gently to a conclusion, somewhat anti-climactically.
To my mind, this album has all the production strengths of Aja, but the songs aren't nearly as strong. But it's not fair to judge it by Aja, this is a great album in its own right, and while not every song is a classic, there's plenty to enjoy in each of them.
4* - while often considered an afterthought from a band falling apart, there's still so much to enjoy here.
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