If you want to feel left out… Unless, of course, you were there.

So what did I learn…

Doc McGhee is a sharp guy with a lot of insight, as are the most successful people in rock and roll. They may not have a CV, but they’ve got brains, and they know how to use them. Doc shoots it straight, only so many people have the talent to make it, there are plenty of gigs as cocktail waitresses, as support in this industry, you can be in it, but the odds of you being on stage…

And then there’s Phil Collen… Who says he’s got to be drunk to go on stage as his avatar.

They all are just regular people. But when done right, rock stars are larger than life.

And they’re in this movie.

It’s not like the Sunset Marquis is an unknown quantity. God, I had dinner there with Jack Casady on his birthday a few months back. Talk about an OG, he’s got stories from before the eighties, the era when the Sunset Marquis truly flourished, when it was the destination of the outrageous. Jack’s agent was staying in the hotel, that’s his regular haunt. As it is for so many managers and others from out of town.

And if you hang around long enough, show up, you too will be privy to memorable insider moments, that’s why you live in L.A., come here, because even though you can make a record in your bedroom, people need to interact, and most of them do it in L.A.

Not New York. That’s a different vibe. The down and dirty seventies? Those musicians can’t even live in Brooklyn anymore. And Times Square has been cleaned up. Manhattan is where money talks, and the bread that speaks is made by people with a lot more cash than musicians.

But back in the eighties… A musician could be as rich and powerful as anybody in America. No longer, which is why the acts sell out to the man and have brand extensions.

But once upon a time…

And that time is gone. History. Never coming back.

Life is all about evolution, even though most can’t do it. They’re stuck in time. Like an aged rock star with long hair and tattoos and a lifted face plying the boards every summer to fans who look decades older.

And the Sunset Marquis evolved. Went upscale you can say. From not quite a dump, to a respectable outlet. They expanded, put in that restaurant, installed the studio. Kudos.

If only the music and those who make it would take note.

Now you could do it and get away with it back then, in the last century, before cellphone cameras. You were free and easy, with plausible deniability. That’s why you became a rock star. AC/DC had it right…getting robbed, getting stoned, getting beat up, broken boned… It’s harder than it looks. And despite “Cribs” and the rest of the image-making machinery of the MTV years, a lot of the famous players were not rich. They had bad deals, there were too many hands in the pot, but they were on stage, they were in the videos, they were famous, their mugs opened doors.

And this movie is all about the stuff the rock stars did behind closed doors. Some so outrageous, nasty, that no one will even talk about them in this film. The Beastie Boys in the hot tub…

Then again, code of the road. We all know stories we cannot tell, we cannot break that bond, otherwise we’d be out. There’s no contract, no deal, just a look in the eye.

And if you’re not on this side of the velvet rope, you think you’re missing out.

And for a long time you were.

But not anymore.

Oh, there are still charts, but there’s more innovation in tech, everyone talks about AI…and isn’t it funny how so many musicians are against it, the same people who knew no limits way back when. What we’ve got is a caricature of what once was. It needs to be reinvented. It’s not about tattoos and long hair… Tom Verlaine had no tattoos, and I’m pretty sure none of the Talking Heads do either. They all looked like people you went to high school with, but they were built different, twisted.

Then again, that’s the east coast intellectualism. Even the Ramones were intellectuals, otherwise how do you come up with the concept, never mind execute it.

But as the eighties rolled on, we got image and bombast.

So… Unless you were a participant, this movie will make you feel like you missed out, that something was happening there and whatever it was, you had no access. And it’s not like the Sunset Marquis is a private club, anyone can book a room there, it’s not even that expensive. But getting behind closed doors, becoming members of the club, it don’t really happen that way at all anymore.

And the man who sang those words, Roger Daltrey, said he never participated, he was in a band with three alcoholics.

And Ian Anderson told me he went back to his hotel room after the gig, sans groupies and substances.

No, the people in this movie…they’re different. They want to be a part of the action, they want to mix with people, they want to use these relationships to their advantage.

Is that you?

Probably not. Musicians are a special breed… Are you willing to hang it all out there on a dream? As Doc McGhee says, he doesn’t want to be involved with anybody who has a Plan B.

So what we’ve got here is a family story, George Rosenthal, who builds the Marquis and his son Mark, who it is named for, who ultimately takes it over.

Rosenthal was as big a rock star as the famous people who stayed at his hotel. An entrepreneur who wheedled his way into Hugh Hefner’s orbit and was inspired to build the Sunset Marquis right down the road and then went on a real estate spree, all based on borrowed cash.

Are you willing to take this risk?

So we’ve got the two Rosenthals, and a slew of rock stars. Genuine rock stars. No one said no to this film. They reminisce about their time at the hotel. Seemingly only Joe Elliott is humble. The rest…they’re luxuriating in their image, this is what they do, create music and become larger than life.

But the era has changed. We can see behind the curtain. Music, like it was before the Beatles, is first and foremost a business, the names come and go, sure you can sell tickets today, but are you changing the world?

When these people were stars, you did. Your image was displayed all over the world on MTV. There was basically one outlet and people were mesmerized by it.

Now MTV is just a pawn, if even that, in the Paramount/WarnerDiscovery merger.

So if you’re a fan, if you’re the kind of person who lives to go to shows, to see your old heroes go through the motions…

You’ve gotta see this movie, you’re gonna love it.

If you’ve got a brain, unlike too many stars today, who are built and promoted by committee, and you want to make an impact in music today, you should see this movie too… Not to salivate and imitate, but to slurp up history and use it as a jumping off point, to do something different.

We’ve seen this paradigm. Of the larger than life. Whether the underlying people deserved it or not, were truly outrageous or not.

But today, no one sits above… All the celebrities going to Rande Gerber’s Whiskey Bar in the Marquis… Most two dimensional…actors can no longer open a movie, their opportunities are mostly on television.

However, there are nobodies from nowhere employing the new digital tools to change the world. And despite the carping from the oldsters’ whose cheese was moved, there’s a lot of humanity in it. It’s just different.

Truly different from what came before.

But if you want to know the way it was…

This film is a good starting point.

This is the song I woke up with in my head this morning. Actually, it was the tail end of “Can’t Find My Way Home,” which segued into “Well All Right.” And as I sat up in bed, I thought how that was the sequence on the album.

No one ever talks about “Had to Cry Today” anymore. No one even talks about Blind Faith. It’s passed into history as an anomaly, a curio, except for “Can’t Find My Way Home,” party to Simon & Garfunkel’s “For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her” as two of the most beautiful songs ever written. In the streaming era “Can’t Find My Way Home” is no longer uncommon, then again, it’s no longer special to me. I still like it, but my innards don’t resonate like they used to when I hear it.

As for “Had to Cry Today”… It’s really about the guitar work that begins at 6:40, with the axes flying in the air like a halo of flies, with that “Itchykoo Park” effect to boot. This is when the track goes over the top, when it enters the stratosphere. I mean you’ve got Winwood and the riff, but when Clapton cuts loose…it exits the intellectual and becomes pure emotion.

Now I think what kills the one and only Blind Faith album, denies it legendary status, is the fifteen plus minute “Do What You Like” on the second side. Every other track is a winner, “Do What You Like” is marginally better than “Toad.”

And speaking of Cream, we were stunned they broke up. Don’t forget this was before the Beatles did so. Acts expired, but they didn’t call it quits at their peak. We found it hard to fathom, for we were invested, we believed…in the music more than the penumbra, unlike members of the BTS Army today. The music stood alone, and the people who made it were gods.

As for Winwood… This was still when Traffic was for insiders, the act didn’t reach mainstream consciousness until after the band broke up and reunited, with “John Barleycorn” and “Low Spark.”

Now the thing about “Barleycorn” is it started out as a Winwood solo album. But even though the sound of the second Traffic album was full-bodied, we were not ready for this, the “Barleycorn” album is rich. And despite the deserved success of the title cut, the peak of that album for me was always “Empty Pages,” which started with a flourish, and then broke down into a lilting ditty, in your mind you could see the spark in Winwood’s step as the track played.

And, of course, it was the seventies when Eric Clapton went solo. Had his peak with Duane Allman and the rest of the Dominos with “Layla,” but the interesting thing about both Winwood and Clapton is they had another peak in the eighties, Winwood’s career defining “Back in the High Life,” Clapton…Russ Titelman worked his magic with him too.

But this was ’69. Back before every act felt it deserved to produce itself. Which is another way to say that the man in control of the Blind Faith project was Jimmy Miller, a footnote today, but a monster before producers became stars outright. It was Miller who was in control when the Stones executed their legendary four album run, from “Beggars Banquet” to “Exile on Main Street.” The Stones went on to have success without him, but the sound changed. The latter day albums, especially the most recent, are noisier, more trebly, they don’t kick you in the gut the same way. The latter-day stuff tries to overpower you into submission, whereas the Miller stuff got into your gut and stayed there. Just think of the sound of “You Can’t Always Get What You Want”…you haven’t heard that full-bodied richness since Miller’s been gone. Ditto on the ethereal quality of “Gimmie Shelter.” When you listen to the Miller albums on a full-blown stereo it’s an experience, it squeezes out the rest of the life, it’s life itself.

And you find a similar quality on the Miller produced second Traffic album, the best one they ever made, with “Forty Thousand Headmen” and “Cryin’ to be Heard,” and the world-weary Dave Mason vocal on the original “Feelin’ Alright?”…Joe Cocker made the song legendary, but it was this 1968 version that truly conveyed the feeling, of a man after a breakup, who wasn’t feelin’ so good himself.

Now you definitely feel that presence, that musical totality, that richness in the first side closer of the one and only Blind Faith album, “Presence of the Lord.” Miller took Clapton’s pipes beyond Cream, the range and emotion were wider, you could hear a three-dimensional person in the music.

As for “Well All Right,” those older than me knew it was originally a Buddy Holly song. I mean at this point, I knew a bunch of Holly’s hits, but what was originally titled “Well…All Right” was the b-side to the 1958 track “Heartbeat,” which only made it to #82 on the “Billboard” Hot 100. And many of us baby boomers…we really started with the Beatles. We knew the earlier hits, but the Beatles had wiped the slate clean, our eyes pointed forward. But the Brits had always looked back, and played our history back to us. Which the Beatle generation ultimately got hooked on with the advent of Cream and the rest of the FM bands in the second half of the sixties.

Which is all to say when I first heard “Well All Right” as done by Blind Faith, I was not comparing it to the original.

Now it’s all there in the original, but it’s more of a blueprint than a final version for Blind Faith. Blind Faith lays down an undeniable, subtle groove that gets your head nodding, and keeps it moving.

Also, there’s that pregnant intro to the vocal, unlike Holly’s take, this track is not a two minute romp. We know something is coming, and we know it’s not going to be downbeat and downtrodden, and when Winwood starts singing, it’s not.

“Well all right so I’ve been foolish
Well all right let people know”

Once again, this is not the fifties, this version of the song is positively rooted in the sixties, when the music was no longer a sideshow, but the main show. There’s no subtlety involved, just pure joy, you hear it in Winwood’s vocal, even though the words themselves might not be that positive. But the song…

Once again, Jimmy Miller creates a full-bodied sound, there’s treble, but it doesn’t overwhelm the middle and the bottom.

Furthermore, you’re not being overpowered, this track is not made to appeal to an ignorant Top 40 audience, this recording is for people in the know, those who purchased those Cream and Traffic albums, who had respect for the music.

And just like in “Had to Cry Today,” it’s the guitar work that separates this remake from the original. Actually, it all starts at 2:50 with the keyboard, and then the guitar, and then the interplay for the rest of the number. This was the breakthrough of FM rock, the stretching out of songs. But this was neither the Dead nor the latter-day jam bands, at least on records, the instrumental section, in this case fading out at the end of the song, was not indulgent, not overblown, rather it was relatively concise, while being delectable at the same time.

The Buddy Holly version of “Well…All Right” is 2:14. And the Blind Faith take contains all of that, but goes on for two plus minutes more, which makes all the difference, Blind Faith makes the song its own.

And think about it… You’ve got Winwood on vocals (and more!), and Clapton on guitars, never mind Ginger Banker holding down the beat. This was the promise of Blind Faith. Which turned out to be a better idea on paper than in real life. It was the tour that killed the band. Because it was more of an idea than a true group. And billed as the first supergroup, Clapton grew tired of the overwhelming attention and retreated into Delaney & Bonnie and it was one and done.

But that does not mean that great work was not delivered. Winwood and Clapton did push each other, the songs on the Blind Faith album are superior to so much of the stuff filling out the albums of the two thereafter.

Then again, this was album rock. Traffic’s only hit was in the U.K., the Dave Mason penned “Hole in My Shoe,” which the rest of the band disowned. As great as “Dear Mr. Fantasy” was, only musos knew it, the live version by Al Kooper and Mike Bloomfield two years later spread the word to more, when FM rock started to truly burgeon across America. Traffic had the goods, just look at the covers, especially Three Dog Night’s “Heaven Is in Your Mind” and Al Kooper’s “Coloured Rain,” never mind Blood, Sweat & Tears’ “Smiling Phases,” but sans AM hits at the time…the band was not a household name.

And it was the same with Cream until the summer of 1968, when “Sunshine of Your Love” crossed over, which is one of the reasons Clapton didn’t want to continue, he wasn’t in it for the hits.

Anyway, as time marches on, fewer and fewer albums and songs are remembered. And the focus devolves into chart hits. But that’s not what it was about in the late sixties and seventies. Then again, when it comes to classic rock oldies, radio does play “Can’t Find Your Way Home” a bit, but the rest of the Blind Faith album may as well not even exist. As big as it was in the summer of Woodstock, when the whole nation was becoming aware of the power of rock and roll.

So ask a youngster who knows the Doors and the Dead about the tracks on the Blind Faith album and they’re going to be flummoxed. Blind Faith has been excised from the canon. Seen mostly as a footnote of excess. But there was a lot more than that, a lot more.

Just listen to “Well All Right.”

Could this be the last time?

Tune in August 7th to Faction Talk, channel 103, at 4 PM East, 1 PM West.

Phone #: 844-686-5863 

If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app. Search: Lefsetz

Thanks for this. I love this track. Was raised on Steely Dan by my mother and my uncle. Mom introduced me to Aja at age of 8. I listened to it incessantly. Then, my uncle introduced me to Katy Lied and I was completely hooked. Yacht rock my ass. Fagan and Becker were mad scientist who combined all kinds of musical elements to form something never heard before or since. I wouldn’t be into music as deeply as I have been my entire life had I not been introduced to Aja and Katie Lied at an early age which led me to consume all of the band’s music. To me, saying you don’t like Steely Dan is like telling me you don’t like The Beatles or Stones. Conversation ender for sure. Hope you are well. ?Peace,?Reg??Scott Register ?Think Indie Distribution/Coalition Of Independent Music Stores
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YES to “Katy Lied.” Always been my favorite Steely Dan album, and I too know it top to bottom, word for word (although “Aja” — specifically the title track — is what I’ve always used as the acid test whenever I set up a sound system).  “Bad Sneakers” never fails to bring me joy, and  “Any World (That I’m Welcome To)” should be required listening, especially given the world we’re living in now.   

True story: years ago, I had a gynecologist named “Dr. Wu.” I tried explaining it, but I don’t think she ever fully understood why i smiled every time I addressed her by name… 

Judy Tint
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Katy Lied has been my on and off favorite Steely Dan album. Two very overlooked tracks in my opinion are “Rose Darling” (it just encapsulates the Steely Dan sound) and “Chain Lightning.” That Rick Derringer guitar solo is killer!!

Rich Madow
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Despite what others say, including Donald & Walter who bemoaned technical malfunctions Katy Lied is one of Steely Dan’s best albums.?The lyrics on Daddy Don’t Live are like a little movie…the phrasing of Fagan’s vocals on Rose Darling are so special…it might be their most underrated song.?And Dr Wu is simply a masterpiece…musically, lyrically and vocally…quintessential Steely Dan.?The story told in Everyone’s Gone To The Movies… of a man and his porn movies is the kind of song their fans love about them. Who else writes a song like that??The same can be said about Any World That I’m Welcome To.?And as you said, Gold Teeth is remarkable.?And Black Friday, of course is one of their most brilliant and famous tracks…the lines you quoted beloved by all their fans…printed on tee shirts.?There are no weak cuts!?Public opinion be damned…the public is often unappreciative of greatness.?That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.?Alan Crane
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Katy Lied is my 2nd favorite Steely Dan album. But to me the best song is the one that gave the album its title, Doctor Wu. It’s like the setup for Deacon Blues. A great Noir story that you can see in your mind as it unfolds. 

Joel Mullis
Charlotte NC
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Katy Lied is my favorite Steely Dan album….It’s one of those “beginning to end” albums where you put it on and listen to it from “beginning to end”.

Fred Raimondi
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“Katy lies?You could see it in her eyes?But imagine my surprise?When I saw you” 

I must have listened to that line from Dr Wu a million times over the years. It wasn’t just the lyrics, but the whole tone and chord structure. It was so sad and beautiful at the  same time. Also, I never cared what the critics said, but Countdown has always been my favorite. It was their last rock and roll album I suppose. Having said that, everything they did in the 70s was great. 

bruce greenberg
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Katie Lied is definitely the Dan’s saddest album due to the disastrous technical problems that haunted it’s recording and the melancholic and beautiful musical epitaph to the disbanded touring band “Bad Sneakers” not to mention the epically sad “Doctor Wu”. The album should have been their best but the technical problems rob it of the glitter and high end it needed. It obviously hurt them and they kind of disowned it. It’s one of my favourites because it’s the last of the recorded in LA collections of songs about NYC before they somewhat predictably moved back to NYC and started writing songs about LA. Fabulous music still!??Jim Hall Wellington, New Zealand
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Pound for pound their best album, IMO.?There’s a great outtake version of Your Gold Teeth II where Fagen marvels at Denny Dias’ solo with some colorful language. And Throw Back The Little Ones might be my favorite deep cut, a typical oddball SD song that ends with album with a piano outro musical question mark.??Mitchell Brook
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You might be unaware of it, but MCA in the 80s put out some Dan albums as 2 for 1s on cassette for cheap. I had the Katy Lied w Royal Scam as the B side. And Can’t Buy a Thrill/Countdown to Ecstasy. Perfect introduction for broke/Dan curious college kid. Spun all those on many car trips. You know, back when you actually listened to albums and gave songs that didn’t grab you at first a chance to grow on you. 
Katy will always be my favorite. Thanks for inspiring me to crank up some Dan this weekend!

Cheers,
Pat Myers
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FYI The Royal Scam has been and will always be my favorite Steely Dan album.  And in conversations with friends, former coworkers and music artists over the years I’ve found many more with the same opinion, so your remark that it’s the least talked about album somewhat surprises me. Maybe it’s so good it doesn’t need to be talked about :)??Jaime Feldman
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Back in the day, “The Royal Scam” was my favorite album from Steely Dan. “Aja” got more attention, but I always leaned toward their earlier stuff; I prefer more of an edge in my music. But probably in the last 20 years (?) or so, “Katy Lied” became my fave.  It all comes down to the songs. I love the entire album — and the side one closing pair of “”Daddy Don’t Live in that New York City No More” into “Doctor Wu” is fantastic. Turn the platter over, and you get “Any World That I’m Welcome To,” IMO one of the greatest songs from the band.

Todd Ellenberg
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The last Steely Dan album that I really paid attention to was Katy Lied.?They seemed to get a bit pretentious ?Of course I did like bits from the other albums.?Bill (live from MN)
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My fave Steely Dan album and I love the first 6. It’s the perfect combo of the more conventionally based harmony of the first two and where they ended up, the complete absorption of jazz harmony. Their melodic adventurism really takes root on Bad Sneakers, Throw Back the Little Ones, etc. They always sang about crazy characters, but is Doctor Wu the most famous? It’s beyond great.

Adam Bernstein
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The Steely Dan album I go back to more than any other.

Peter Buffett
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I lit up the internet one night in 2022 when I posted to a Steely Dan Facebook group that I thought “Doctor Wu” was the precursor to, if not almost the same song as, “Aja.” Obviously, they are different songs, but the groove, the path, and the instrumentation are such that my mind drew a line between the two.

And as I understand it, they hated the recording of Katy Lied so much that they never listened to it once it was released. It seemed reasonable to me that they may have taken another shot at the “Doctor Wu” masterpiece and come up with an additional masterpiece in “Aja.”

My comment was heard round the world. I could see the reactions timed to the sun’s path: Britain, the East Coast, Middle America, and then the West Coast.

Well, let me tell you, people did not agree. And boy did they need to tell me. I woke up in the morning to about 500 venomous comments, and like a newbie, I answered them all.

Kind regards, 
Rob Whittaker
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Far and away my favorite Steely Dan album.  

Michael Becker
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I was given Katy Lied by my then 21 yr old wife for my 26th birthday in ’76, she knew I liked the Dan as our second date was listening to the first three albums on my parents old one piece stereo with the turntable in the middle of the console.  The album grabbed me from day one, the lyrics were even more obtuse and dark than ever, and I played it on heavy rotation until our separation and eventual divorce  a year or so later (Federal agents seemed to have a lot of workplace marriages at the time and almost all failed, maybe the work, the playtimes or just the 70’s (man!)).  I must admit though that my favourite is Dr Wu, which references the titular Katy’s lies, you can see it in her eyes, and various low level scenarios, and it appealed to my mindset back then and even now.

Tony Barnes
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Bob, thank you for talking about one of my favourite tracks by my all time favourite band. I got Can’t by a Thrill on an 8-track(!) when I was about 9 and have loved every album, plus both Becker and Fagen’s solo catalogues ever since. I managed to see them twice when Walter was still with us, and if you love Daddy Don’t Live, you gotta hear him singing it! https://youtu.be/usTlb6yhlDo

Patrick Charles
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Phil Woods on Dr Wu and Hal Blane on Any World That I’m Welcome To!  Katy Lied is a great record.  Pina Colada or not. Yes, one of the coolest lines ever.  

David Leonard
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It’s funny how depending on the bubble one is in, things you’ve always known or believed may or may not be true. In my crowd of very early Steely Dan fans (many of whom hung out and spoke to one another at Aaron’s Records (at one of the original locations on Melrose), Rhino Records (on Santa Monica, before Westwood) or Moby Disc (a “Whale of a Record Store” in Van Nuys), the cult-like belief was that the “even number” Steely Dan albums were better than the odd numbered ones. 

We all “knew” that Countdown To Ecstasy was better, by far, than the first album. Just as Katy Lied was so much better than Pretzel Logic. Or Aja outclassed the Royal Scam or Gaucho. My crowd of early Steely Dan fans thought then, and in some ways I still think, that Chain Lightning was about as good a recording as Steely Dan ever made. It may have been Rick Derringer’s finest moment. And you didn’t even mention it.

Over the years, though, my longtime friends and I have very much learned to appreciate Pretzel Logic and the Royal Scam, and even Gaucho (but not the first album). So maybe the “even albums are better” mantra was disproven over time. But that doesn’t mean we like Katy Lied any less. As you noted Black Friday, Bad Sneakers, Dr. Wu and Your Gold Teeth II, in addition to Chain Lightning, remain Dan classics. 

Jeffrey Wruble
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Steely Dan was my band from Countdown to Gaucho. Didn’t know it was yacht rock at the time. Still play it often at my old age.

Tom Elmer
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Royal Scam has always been my favorite SD record for many reasons but I loved Katy Lied too. Lots of acoustic piano – the tracks have more of a rootsy feel because of that. Also Jeff Porcaro’s playing on Bad Sneakers is the ultimate cool, spare groove. All around the tracks are more bare bones proving that the band never needed to up their game by using Steve Gadd or Wayne Shorter – which takes nothing away from their contributions but it was really just about the artistry of Donald and Walter.

Frank Canino
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And don’t forget “Royal Scam’s” “Don’t Take Me Alive” with Larry Carlton’s iconic blistering lead guitar intro!??Thanks,?Larry Bole
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Hi Bob. Beyond the 7 or so tunes that get overplayed on streaming services, so much of Steely Dan’s catalogue has either been forgotten or is underappreciated. I think their recording career went out with a whimper, but the totality of the gems left behind is outstanding. If you haven’t already, check out the series done on Steely Dan on Raised by Hippies
 https://r.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=Awrij9icAHVqRQIAeBtXNyoA;_ylu=Y29sbwNiZjEEcG9zAzEEdnRpZAMEc2VjA3Ny/RV=2/RE=1787262365/RO=10/RU=https%3a%2f%2fwww.youtube.com%2fchannel%2fUCbyV0RGP7-RxAjCb922JyvA/RK=2/RS=Rt3q3_117Z5cbRppaNhvoQfar.g-
Thanks for spotlighting Katy Lied; a very fine piece of work!

Barry Wolfish
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Great that you wrote about Steely Dan.
 
As someone very deep into all 9 studio albums (and the first 2 Fagen solo albums), I’m disappointed that you wrote about Katy Lied and didn’t mention my personal favorite track, Doctor Wu.
 
Amazing track in every way, and the sax solo, especially the last part, just slays me.
 
Thanks Bob!
 
Eric D. Rapkin
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Bob, “Katy Lied” has always been my favorite SD album. “Doctor Wu” is one of my favorite tunes. “Are you with me, Doctor?”

Barry K. Herman, M.D., M.M.M.
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Katy Lied is the best SD album

Clarke Kelly
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“Katy Lied” is their best album – writing, playing, singing. Period.

David Frail
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My favorite Steely Dan album with Doctor Wu being my favorite Steely Dan track.??Any World is also great!??Best,??Lee Stein
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The first Steely Dan album I ever bought, as a cutout too.  Also my favorite.  I consider it their best.

Joel Goldman
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IMO, Katy Lied was Steely Dan’s Rubber Soul. A master class in songwriting and despite the fact that Becker and Fagen supposedly hated the recording (when didn’t they?) I felt it had a real organic feel to it as opposed to the slightly more brittle Pretzel Logic. Finding nits to pick on Steely Dan lps is the ultimate exercise in hair splitting.??William Nollman?Silvermine
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This letter was lyrical. In all sincerity.

Katy Lied was the record whose grooves I wore down. 

Keep on writing, fellow scribe.

All the best,
Claudia Hirsch

NYC