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Alan Parsons Project vs Steely Dan |
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rogerthat 
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Joined: September 03 2006 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 9869 |
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 Posted: January 18 2019 at 09:14 |
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Uh indeed. Strikes me as a very odd comparison. Yeah, Dan. |
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AFlowerKingCrimson
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Joined: October 02 2016 Location: Philly burbs Status: Offline Points: 16144 |
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 09:24 |
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Wow, I just come back to look at this now and APP is getting stomped on. Wow.
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AFlowerKingCrimson
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 09:25 |
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I explained in the first page the similarities. I don't need to re-post that do I?
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Polymorphia
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Joined: November 06 2012 Location: here Status: Offline Points: 8856 |
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 09:35 |
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AFlowerKingCrimson
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 09:41 |
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You and I were both surprised then.
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Progosopher
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 11:05 |
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Prefer listening to APP but have to give the musicianship medal to SD.
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The world of sound is certainly capable of infinite variety and, were our sense developed, of infinite extensions. -- George Santayana, "The Sense of Beauty"
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TCat
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 14:40 |
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Steely Dan had less commercial music than APP, and that wins it for me. While it's true that SD's later music after the masterwork Aja started to sound too much the same, they had some great albums that came out before that, more than APP. Now, it is true that Alan Parsons has had an enormous impact on progressive music, mostly in the production and engineering areas, his Project was mostly just too commercial, though that music is nearly flawless. Kudos to APP for Tales of Mystery and Imagination, I Robot, Pyramid and Turn of a Friendly Card, even these albums, except the first, leaned to the progressive-lite side, where Steely Dan were much more progressive, leaning more on jazz than on pop.
Steely Dan gets the vote!
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dwill123
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 14:57 |
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The Dan
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dr wu23
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 15:31 |
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The Dan for sure......
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One does nothing yet nothing is left undone.
Haquin |
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micky
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 16:37 |
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hahah.. raising your uhhh's. and uh's.. with a big pfff. like zero contest or actually.. much of any comparison. APP is nice. and I enjoy their albums. S.D was the total package however A decade of classic and critically acclaimed, commerically successful albums.. as well as being one of hte most respected groups by muso's for they were among the best.. if not THE best collections of musical talent ever put to vinyl..and the cherry on top. Next to Lennon-McCartney.. perhaps the greatest songwriting duo popular music has ever seen.. or will see.
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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Polymorphia
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 16:55 |
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Critical acclaim, commercial success, and the respect of musicians have nothing to do with it. Steely Dan have just got it goin on.
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Frenetic Zetetic
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 17:35 |
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Steely Dan.
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"I am so prog, I listen to concept albums on shuffle." -KMac2021 |
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jamesbaldwin
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 17:39 |
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Both high-class patinated music, near to easy listening.
More form than substance. APP worked more on musical composition. But I prefer Steely Dan, they have done music author. The first Steely Dan are the most spontaneous ones.
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"Happiness is real only when shared"
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rogerthat
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 19:18 |
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Yeah, well, even looking for bands with only that kind of tenuous link, maybe Sparks Vs Dan would have been a better poll. Though they would still be wildly different but I can at least imagine enough people caring about Kimono or Propaganda to make it a fight. I like APP by the way, but they used sessions guys to put together Floyd lite or, if you will, Division Bell before it was made. While Dan used them to make jazz rock in an accessible format. No comparison and no surprises as to why Dan would beat APP here. |
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AFlowerKingCrimson
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 19:28 |
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^Thanks for sharing your opinion.
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verslibre
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 19:29 |
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Neither. That is all.
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kenethlevine
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 20:20 |
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APP
I don't doubt SD's talent but they seemed to have the knack of arranging that made most of their songs stale before they finished playing the first time
Edited by kenethlevine - January 18 2019 at 20:22 |
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Atavachron
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 20:40 |
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^ Overworked? Yeah that's fair, though I suspect they were just so seasoned by the time they started recording together that the seamless production probably couldn't be helped. You can't go backward. |
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"Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought." -- John F. Kennedy
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rogerthat
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Joined: September 03 2006 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 9869 |
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 20:46 |
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Well, from watching the classic albums docu about Aja and reading Ian Dury's writings about the band (he loved them), I think it is FAIR to say the duo did make the musicians play it again and again and again until they got what they wanted. Apparently, the musicians had nicknamed Fagen "Mother" for being a real pain in the whatever. So the spontaneity does get sucked out of the final recording. HOWEVER, I don't hear any spontaneity in APP's music either and if anything, the grooves are half-dead if not totally. Only the melodies and Woolfson's serene delivery thereof keep the music going (consequently, some of the more questionable guest vocals suffer in comparison). Whereas, certainly CTE, Pretzel and Royal Scam (esp the last) don't lack in grooves; Green Earrings is practically roaring to my ears. I have discussed about music a lot with Ken and I can say he is not very fond of ironic or snide music. In that case, you can't really relate to the very soul of Steely Dan because it's pretty much drenched in irony save maybe a Deacon Blues. Me, I love the irony and especially the way Fagen delivers it. Some music is meant to make you laugh, not cry. Apparently, Fagen and Becker would be laughing their ass off all the time at the lines they came up with and it's not hard to imagine that.
Edited by rogerthat - January 18 2019 at 20:47 |
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AFlowerKingCrimson
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Posted: January 18 2019 at 21:04 |
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Sorry but that doesn't really make sense. If they were good at arranging how would that make their songs stale?  Anyway, for the longest time my biggest problem with Steely Dan is they seemed "stuffy" to me for lack of a better term. Kind of like to music what Woody Allen was to movies. "Hey, I'm cool but you don't get it because you didn't go to college or read the books that intellectuals read" kind of thing. In other words pretentious in their outlook and presentation if not necessarily in the final product. It always seemed like they were a rock band who wished they could play jazz and be a jazz band but wanted instead the commercial success of a rock band and to me that seemed pretentious and off putting. It wasn't until way later when I learned to just accept them for what they are which was a band making music they wanted to make which in a way was what prog was all about even though they weren't a prog band.
Edited by AFlowerKingCrimson - January 18 2019 at 21:06 |
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Atavachron wrote: