Donald Fagen “Morph the Cat”
The very first time I heard “Reelin’ in the Years” part of me recognized that it was, in fact, a perfect song. That part of me -- the cyborg, pattern recognizing part -- computed the sound (immaculate), words (smart and cynical), musicianship (ace) and structure (familiar and tight) and concluded that there was nothing empirically flawed. To this day, the song has a spell on me. I absolutely love it. I desire to hear it.
The other part of me -- the very flawed, heart pumping, miracle that it all works, Rube Goldberg machine, emotional, human part -- is confounded by Steely Dan. I find their music to be so pleasant, but also so opaque, dispassionate and erudite, that I have avoided the approach for nearly thirty years. Yep. Since I was a teenager trying to figure out what it is I liked or didn’t like about “Aja,” I have basically given up on the endeavor. I concluded that Steely Dan was a band I did not understand, but also wondered if I could understand them or if I wanted to.
Little did I know that I was not alone. It seems much of the universe has been toiling with this question for almost fifty years. “Is Steely Dan knowable”? Are they unassailable musical geniuses who decoded a language between Jazz and Pop? Are they wise and empathetic or cold and unfeeling? Are they more responsible for Phish or for War on Drugs? Or Kenny G, for that matter? And that Donald Fagen? Was he a shy hipster with tremendous humanity or was he a misanthropist, perfectionist, jazzbo, second coming of Glenn Gould. No — the young, vital and what’s-new-and-what’s-next me was not going to dwell on Steely Dan. That felt like homework.
But every five to ten years, there would be another drip. Another signal. A friend would ask my position on Steely Dan. Another might ask if I’d heard Donald Fagen’s latest solo record. Drip. Drip. The avoidance felt like torture. And so, in 2020, as I sat firmly and comfortably in middle age, and, with pixels of this blog to fill about the music of middle-aged men, I resolved that I could no longer avoid The Dan. And that the big toe I would dip into the water would be solo Donald Fagen. It felt sensible. Less deep. Less divisive. Yes. I would sit and listen to the music of fifty something year Donald Fagen.
I opted not to listen to his debut, “The Nightfly,” because it felt too close to peak Steely Dan and because it was consistently lavished with praise. Fagen was not yet forty when that record came out — too close to the source of my problem. I wasn’t ready for that. “Kamakiriad,” his second album, was all about a flying car. He was forty four when it came out. Again, I passed, mostly on its basic premise. All of that equivocation brought me here, to “Morph the Cat,” an album that Donald Fagen made about urban ennui in his mid fifties.
Everything I feared and hoped for is right there. You can hear every single instrument perfectly. Fagen’s Fender Rhodes. The jazzy guitars. The funky guitars. The searing solos. The muscular bass. The tenor sax. The melodica. The vibraphone. The high hat. The cymbals. The backing vocals. And, of course, the pinched, but also pitch perfect, tones of Donald Fagen’s voice.
With eight songs (plus a short reprise of the title track) spanning fifty minutes, each song gets space to stretch out. This is mostly a Jazz and Funk fusion record. It’s a work in contradiction. The instruments sound warm but the music is minty cool. Every song has extended jams and yet, you never feel like they are unnecessary. Instead, you get the feeling that each solo comes in when it’s supposed to and each song ends at precisely the right time. You don’t tire of the grooves or the showmanship. The lyrics are literary and observational, but, being that they are situated in New York City, you also sense that the stories are very personal.
“Morph the Cat’ does not have a best or worst track. It’s all of one gestalt. There is no Rock like “Reelin’ in the Years” or Jazzy Pop like “Ricky Don’t Lose That Number” or “Do It Again.” The band here is playing Jazz in a few hues. One shade veers into Blues on “What I Do.” On “Brite Nightgown,” they evoke the Funk of contemporary Jam bands. Elsewhere, as on “The Great Pagoda of Funn,” it even sounds like Muzak. And as much as I avoid each of those styles, I quite enjoy them in Fagen’s hands.
“Morph the Cat” and “The Night Belongs to Mona” are the most memorable tracks, in part, because they are great New York City songs. The title track describes a bawdy spirit that spirit that enters the systems of New York and creates a uniquely urban malaise -- a “mindbath,” to hear Fagen describe it. His words are evocative and accurate on top of the dense pitch, muted horns and white hot guitars. “The Night Belongs to Mona” almost reads like mature Lou Reed lyrics on top of the slightest singalong structure Fagen can tolerate. He sings about Mona, his nocturnal friend in her Chelsea high rise apartment:
“Maybe it's good that she's above it all
Things don't seem as dark
When you're already dressed in black
We try not to see the writing on the wall
What happens tomorrow
When the moonrays get so bright
When she rises towards the starlight
Miles above the city's heat
Will she fall hard or float softly to the street
Tonight the night belongs to Mona
When she's dancing all alone
Forty floors above the city
CD spinnin', AC hummin', feelin' pretty”
It turns out that “Morph the Cat” is every bit as sophisticated and well played as I feared and hoped. It also turns out that I am able to both embrace and enjoy the Fusion Jam anxiety that I have unnecessarily repressed for decades. Clearly, Donald Fagen has something figured out about music. He is right about some things. Empirically so. My computer brain parts can confirm this. Now, as to whether my heart is ready for the full Steely Dan, and the Phish, Zappa and Spyro Gyra it all contemplates, I’m still unsure.