Author: Jernej Vene
Location: Lucca / Italy
Concert date: 27.07.2007
Attendance: 4000
Ticket price: 38.00 – 43.00€
The duo Steely Dan, made up of keyboardist and lead vocalist Donald Fagen and guitarist Walter Becker, wrapped up the European leg of this year’s Heavy rollers tour with a Saturday show in the picturesque Tuscan city of Lucca. The biggest square inside the city’s Roman walls had room for 4000 people who came to see the legendary duo. Steely Dan have been around, with a few breaks, since 1972, but this was their first time ever playing in Italy. That’s exactly why the buzz around the show was huge, and besides the two of us, a few die-hard fans of the band from Novo mesto made the long trip too. Steely Dan’s music is a blend of pop, light jazz, soul, rhythm ‘n’ blues and rock. Their records have always set high standards for how music gets recorded. Fagen and Becker set up this year’s tour very ambitiously, at least as far as the backing band goes, which Becker called The Steely Dan orchestra during the show. The ten-piece group delivered a solid musical foundation and plenty of help in recreating their songs. The atmosphere at the show was hot, at times downright ecstatic, since a lot of locals had been waiting years and years for Steely Dan to show up. From chats with a few people in the crowd, I learned they’d come from all over Italy, with Padua, Rome, Naples, Milan and Bari among the cities mentioned. Steely Dan leave nothing to chance live, either. As usual, despite the soundcheck the musicians do in the afternoon, the sound at the start of a show is always pretty far from optimal. The same thing happened with Steely Dan. In the hot summer evening the techs managed to get all the instruments and voices almost where they needed to be, but a few small shades were missing before it reached perfection, especially in the bass. Otherwise the whole orchestra is tight as a drum, which is an absolute must for Steely Dan’s complex music. Particularly impressive were drummer Keith Carlock, bassist Freddie Washington, guitarist and musical director Jon Herrington, and the entire four-piece horn section. Steely Dan walked through their whole catalog, with songs from all the major albums, but unfortunately some crowd favorites were left out, especially Rikki don’t lose that number and Reelin’ in the years. I missed, for example, Do it again, the song that gave Steely Dan their breakthrough in 1973, as well as Deacon blues and Hey nineteen. Donald Fagen’s voice shows a bit that he’s getting on in years, but that’s no excuse for handing the vocals on the hit Haitian divorce over to his buddy Walter Becker. His interpretation and vocal tone are completely different, and live he didn’t particularly convince me. As for his guitar playing and the interplay with guitarist Harrington, though, hats off!
Even though Lucca is about the size of Ljubljana, with the help of sponsors the organizers managed to host the following acts in July: Elton John, Norah Jones, Dianne Warwick, John Legend, Ricky Martin, Lauryn Hill, Joss Stone, George Michael, and to close out the Summer festival, as this event is called, Steely Dan. Slovenia is a small market and we’ll just have to live with that…
In an hour and three quarters, the Steely Dan orchestra played a handful of legendary songs that have long been part of pop music’s treasure trove, and added a few newer ones from the new millennium. Personally I missed a slightly louder sound, but I have no complaints about the performance, since the people up on that stage are musicians whose careers are steeped in collaborations with the big names of the world’s pop music.
Setlist
1. Jeri (instrumental intro without Becker and Fagen)
2. Time Out of Mind
3. Godwhacker
4. Bad Sneakers
5. Two Against Nature
6. Don’t Take Me Alive
7. Peg
8. Haitian Divorce
9. The Royal Scam
10. Dirty Work
11. Green Earrings
12. Josie
13. Aja
14. Kid Charlemagne
—encore—
15. Pretzel Logic
16. My Old School
17. Carolyn (closing instrumental without Becker and Fagen)
STEELY DAN LINEUP:
Donald Fagen – lead vocals, keyboards
Walter Becker – guitar, vocals
—————————-
Keith Carlock – drums
Jon Herington – guitar
Carolyn Leonhart-Escoffery – backing vocals
Michael Leonhart – trumpet
Cindy Mizelle – backing vocals
Jim Pugh – trombone
Roger Rosenberg – baritone sax
Freddie Washington – bass guitar
Walt Weiskopf – saxophone
Jeff Young – keyboards, backing vocals
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