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Two things are clear from listening to Circus Money, the second album from Steely Dan guitarist Walter Becker. The first is that he's been listening to a lot of reggae recently. The second is that, without sarky old Donald Fagen to ruin his chances of pulling, he's quite the ladies' man - or so he would have us believe.
The reggae connection is, if anything, the more startling of the two revelations. Of course, the mildly tropical-sounding Haitian Divorce was one of Steely Dan's biggest hits, but this is something else. Somewhere near the start of an extraordinarily detailed seven-page press release, Becker reveals that he's been listening to virtually nothing else for the past two years, becoming "something of an expert on various sub-genres, such as songs about motorcycles and/or featuring motorcycle sound effects; songs about the barbers versus the dreads, and songs about various judicial procedures."
It's a shame that such an unusually detailed immersion in Jamaican culture has had so little positive effect; for the reggae-led bulk of Circus Money is so devoid of authenticity that it makes 10cc's Dreadlock Holiday sound like something from a Trojan Records box set. Following in the noble tradition of white artists using weedy fascimiles of reggae backings to mask a lack of ideas and finagle a modicum of cool, Becker spends track after track anchored in unvarying, half-arsed cod-Caribbean skanking.
Much more entertaining are the lyrics. Circus Money inhabits a crepuscular soft-lit world of smooth seduction, no less hilarious for all its desperate seriousness. Freed from Donald Fagen's bracingly acidic sneer, Walter sets about the ladies in earnest, confidently armed with cheesy lines and a selection of fine wines. On Downtown Canon he moves in with "Alsatian wine, playing records way past four / Making some crazy soulful love on the hardwood floor". Sounds like a recipe for disaster in the form of heartburn, over-tiredness and backache to me, but then I'm not one of Walter's fragrant targets I suppose.
On Selfish Gene things take a slightly different turn: "Hey pretty baby let's have a little fun / The Pinot is flowing and the night is young". Less risk of heartburn, over-tiredness or backache with that plan; I admit. Elsewhere we get ladies with "creamy thighs and bedroom eyes". Down, Walter, down!
Door Number Two is another rum one. The song references an "assignation with a college girl" and expresses a good deal of curiosity about passing through the aforementioned secondary door. Apparently the title came to Walter in a dream and the meaning remains a mystery. Well goodness. I'm sure Freud could decipher that one without an enormous amount of trouble. Dirty Walter!
Aside from the reggae and the corny lyrics, there are actually a lot of the raw materials that make up a really good Steely Dan record laying around here. There's the smooth jazzy flourishes, the metallic guitars always threatening to break into a solo, the honky-tonk electric piano, the all-girl backing vocals. In theory, these are the components of another Gaucho, but in practice the mix feels cold and functional, never quite breaking into the flow of the 'Dan.
Only on Somebody's Saturday Night does the album graze the warm, funky, witty heights of Becker's glory days. Here, jazz wins over reggae, and the lyrics are smart enough to rival Donald Fagen's ("She looked good in the available light / She was somebody’s Saturday night"). Unfortunately, Becker's flat, world-weary voice isn't up to communicating the sarcasm which could bring this alive.
At worst, cheesy and ill-considered; at best, a passable facsimile of late Steely Dan. Still, Donald Fagen is sure to be delighted.
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