Walter Becker and the anti-ego of Steely Dan
When Walter Becker walked into the studio on any given day for a Steely Dan session, there was no guarantee that he would be featured on anything. In an era where the rock star was at its most flamboyant and visible, Becker was a ghost that haunted his own music. His name was in the songwriting and production credits. On early Steely Dan albums, he was credited as the only bass player, illustrating his recorded contributions clearly. But then something strange happened: Becker almost completely ceded his performing duties to session musicians.
The history of non-performing musicians predates Steely Dan. Bands like the Grateful Dead, King Crimson, and Hawkwind all had salaried members who didn’t take the stage with the rest of the group. But those were all lyricists – members who weren’t needed in the live performance setting. Becker was an integral part of the Steely Dan band. So how could he just step away from his role in the group?
For Becker, the answer was simple. “Once I met Chuck Rainey, I felt there really was no need for me to be bringing my bass guitar to the studio anymore,” Becker claimed in 1995. That answer belies the bigger picture: Steely Dan was evolving at a rapid pace. The material that Becker was writing with his artistic partner, singer/keyboardist Donald Fagen, was moving beyond the capabilities of the band’s standard rock set-up. Although they had a core quintet of highly-accomplished musicians that made up the original Steely Dan band, Becker and Fagen began hiring session players as their desire for perfection began to reach unprecedented levels.
Becker’s ceding of the spotlight began gradually. On 1973’s Countdown to Ecstacy, jazz bassist Ray Brown plays standup bass on the song ‘Razor Boy’. Steely Dan had been bringing in guest musicians since their 1972 debut, Can’t Buy a Thrill, but suddenly, session players began to invade the band’s compositions. On 1974’s Pretzel Logic, the solid makeup of the original band’s lineup began to break down as Becker and Fagen replaced their bandmates with other musicians. Becker also began to play the guitar (his primary instrument) on Pretzel Logic before Steely Dan decided to retire from live performance after the album was released.
Without a need for a touring band, the original lineup of Steely Dan was mostly dissolved as Becker and Fagen began crafting studio albums primarily with session players. Pretzel Logic was the first album to feature Rainey, who became the band’s bass player of choice for sessions. Fagen was Steely Dan’s lead singer, so he was required to contribute to every song. Becker didn’t have that responsibility, and as he and Fagen began to prefer dense and complex jazz-infused arrangements, Becker found it easier to dictate what sessions musicians should play rather than playing the parts himself.
Becker didn’t completely disappear from Steely Dan records, though. He’s a credited musician on all of the band’s albums, but other than the occasional guitar solo on songs like ‘Bad Sneakers’ and ‘Josie’, Becker was rarely heard within the band’s arrangements. For the band’s most well-known album, 1977’s Aja, Becker doesn’t appear in any fashion on the songs ‘Black Cow’ or ‘Peg’. Instead, Becker began to focus on lyrics, composition, arrangements, and artwork, the latter of which included taking the photo that appeared on the cover of Aja.
Becker’s lack of recorded musical contributions became even more noticeable on 1980’s Gaucho. Becker only appears on three of the album’s seven songs, leaving a majority of the album without any musical tracks recorded by half of Steely Dan. The injuries he sustained after getting hit by a car likely added to his absences, as did his girlfriend’s death due to a drug overdose in January of 1980. Initially, it seemed that Becker was stepping away because of a lack of ego; now, it seemed like he was disappearing.
Not long after the release of Gaucho, Steely Dan entered into a decade-long hiatus. When they returned in 1993, it came with an astounding addition: for the first time in nearly 20 years, Steely Dan would be playing live concerts. Once again out on the road, Becker’s musical contributions began to flourish as the group’s permanent guitarist. On 2000’s Two Against Nature, Becker played on all but one of the album’s tracks. On 2003’s Everything Must Go, for the first time Countdown to Ecstacy, Becker performed on every single album track.
