Suggestaholic!

 I don’t believe in My Favorite Albums of All-Time lists, because I think it’s an impossible thing to capture. At least it is for me… My favorites are ever-changing, constantly expanding and contracting. Sort of like Oprah’s ass.

But I can tell you one thing: regardless of whatever else I might put there, depending on mood or sunspot activity, The Nightfly would absolutely appear on such a list (that will never exist). Know what I mean?

Back in the early days of the CD, when players were the size of a toaster oven, and record stores only stocked about five titles which cost forty bucks each and hung on hooks behind the cash register, I bought a CD copy of Donald Fagen’s first solo album.

And it was the very first album I deemed worthy of a vinyl-to-compact disc upgrade. My friends all thought I’d lost my freakin’ mind. You paid how much, for something you already own?! Hoooo-ly shit…

But I stand by the decision; my fondness for that record has only grown during the past quarter-century. In fact, I’d go so far as to break my own rule and proclaim it one of my Top Ten Favorite Albums of All-Time. It’s the other nine that might prove to be a little slippery…

I was (and am) a longtime Steely Dan fanatic (Danatic?), which made the original LP purchase a necessity. But, and this will probably get me into some hot water, I believe The Nightfly is better than any of the Steely Dan records. The sound is similar to his once and future band’s, but the difference is in the lyrics. And its brilliance translates all the way down to the cover photos, if you can dig it.

The front features Fagen as a late-night early-‘60s disc jockey, chain-smoking and looking slightly disheveled. Very cool. But the back of the album is the kicker. It shows a row of suburban homes at night, with a light shining in a single bedroom window. It’s where the narrator, Fagen as a young man, is listening to the cool-cat DJ on the front, and dreaming adolescent dreams of Kennedy-era America.

And that’s the record’s concept, perfectly illustrated. The Nightfly, according to the liner notes, “represents certain fantasies that might have been entertained by a young man growing up in the remote suburbs of a northeastern city during the late fifties and early sixties, i.e., one of my general height, weight and build.”

The lyrics are uncharacteristically direct, and uncharacteristically optimistic and free of sarcasm. It’s funny as hell, and not only creates, but sustains, a relevant mood. The songs sound simple at first, but then you find yourself getting involved with the characters and the ideas, and painting big complicated pictures inside your head.

I love The Nightfly, it’s been a companion for most of my life. There’s some kind of crazy magic happening in those eight songs…

Now, won’t you pour me a Cuban Breeze, Gretchen?

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