Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).
Kid Charlemagne (1976)
Steely Dan is a band that provokes extreme reactions. Some people, like the late great Steve Albini, couldn't stand them. Others love them. I was always in the latter category, although I never saw them play live. Formed in 1971 by Walter Becker (guitars, bass) and Donald Fagen (lead vocals, keyboards), the band played live for a few years before becoming a studio band, utilizing a changing assemblage of session musicians.
Becker and Fagen met in 1967 while students at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. One of their early bands included Chevy Chase on drums. After college, Becker and Fagen moved to Brooklyn and tried to sell their songs in the Brill Building in Manhattan. They got some work on the soundtrack of an obscure Richard Pryor movie (You've Got to Walk It Like You Talk It or You'll Lose That Beat) and writing and playing on an album by Linda Hoover. They also played for 18 months in the touring band of Jay and the Americans.
Finally, they decided to start a band of their own with guitarists Denny Diaz and Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, drummer Jim Hodder and singer David Palmer, who was hired as a second lead vocalist because Fagen suffered from stage fright and because their label, ABC Records, didn't think his voice was commercial enough. Their 1972 debut album Can't Buy a Thrill had three hit singles: "Do It Again," "Reelin' in the Years" and "Do It Again." Palmer sang lead on the band's tour, but Becker and producer Gary Katz convinced Fagen to take over while Palmer left.
The band continued to have success with their subsequent albums, Countdown to Ecstasy, Pretzel Logic and Katy Lied, with the latter album featuring a large collection of session players, including guitarist Larry Carlton. On Steely Dan's 1976 album The Royal Scam, Carlton was featured prominently, especially on the single "Kid Charlemagne." The song features funk and jazz elements while focusing on the story of a drug dealer in the psychedelic 1960s on the West Coast. Becker and Fagen have said the song was loosely inspired by San Francisco-based LSD chemist Owsley Stanley.
"While the music played you worked by candlelight/Those San Francisco nights/You were the best in town/Just by chance you crossed the diamond with the pearl/You turned it on the world/That's when you turned the world around."
The song's lyrics are typically intricate and interesting.
"On the hill the stuff was laced with kerosene/But yours was kitchen clean/Everyone stopped to stare at your technicolor motor home/Every A-frame had your number on the wall/You must have had it all/You'd go to LA on a dare/And you'd go it alone. Could you live forever?/Could you see the day?/Could you feel your whole life drift apart and fade away/Get along/Get along, Kid Charlemagne/Get along, Kid Charlemagne."
Stanley was busted in 1967 when his car reportedly ran out of gas. "Clean this mess or we'll all end up in jail/Those test tubes and the scale/Just get it all out of here/Is there gas in the car?/Yes, there's gas in the car/I think the people down the hall/Know who you are."
The generally jazzy arrangement features a ripping guitar solo by Carlton from 2:18 into the song until 3:08, and another as the song fades out. "Kid Charlemagne" hit #82 on the Billboard Hot 100, while The Royal Scam got to #15 on the Billboard 200 and was their fourth platinum album in the U.S.
Steely Dan released two more albums before splitting up in 1981 and sporadically working on projects throughout the '80s. Becker and Fagen reunited in 1993 when Becker produced Fagen's second solo album Kamakiriad; Becker then played in Fagen's band on the subsequent tour. They toured as Steely Dan in 1994 and 1996, and then released Two Against Nature in 2000. The album won four Grammy Awards. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001 and then released Everything Must Go in 2003. The band toured periodically over the years until Becker's death in 2017. Fagen has continued on as Steely Dan, continuing to tour into this year.
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