Steely Dan - The Royal Scam

Titles

1. Kid Charlemagne

2. The Caves of Altamira

3. Don't Take Me Alive

4. Sign in Stranger

5. The Fez

6. Green Earrings

7. Haitian Divorce

8. Everything You Did

9. The Royal Scam

Steely Dan sold over 40 million albums worldwide and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in March 2001. VH1 ranked Steely Dan number 82 on its list of the 100 Greatest Musicians of All Time. Rolling Stone ranked them number 15 on its list of the 20 Greatest Duos of All Time.

Steely Dan's fifth, multi-platinum studio album, "The Royal Scam," produced by Gary Katz and originally released in 1976 on ABC Records, marked a turning point in the careers of Donald Fagen and Walter Becker: it featured more emphatic guitar work than the previous album, "Katy Lied," the first LP without founding guitarist Jeff Baxter. The guitar parts on "The Royal Scam" were played by Walter Becker, Denny Dias, Larry Carlton, Elliott Randall, and Dean Parks. The album, which quickly reached number 15 on the Billboard 200 , laid the foundation for the complex arrangements, refined musicianship, and cynical lyrics that would become the band's trademark. It is considered one of the group's most musically experimental works. From the funky uptempo number “Kid Charlemagne” to the Latin-tinged “The Caves Of Altamira” and the jazzy “Don't Take Me Alive” , the album offers a wide range of musical styles and is considered the most experimental work of this brilliant duo.

The lyrics explore themes of betrayal, corruption, and disillusionment, often centering on characters who are morally ambiguous or downright evil. Like other Steely Dan albums , "The Royal Scam" is also filled with cryptic references to real and fictional people and events. In a 2000 BBC interview, Becker and Fagen revealed that "Kid Charlemagne" was loosely inspired by Owsley Stanley, the infamous "drug chef" known for producing hallucinogens, and that "Caves of Altamira" was based on a book by Hans Baumann and dealt with the loss of innocence.

The production is also exceptionally refined, with a clear and precise sound that emphasizes the band's technical virtuosity. Rolling Stone wrote in a review: "Becker and Fagen have truly written the ultimate 'outlaw' album here, something countless Southern bands have been denied because their concept of the outlaw is so narrow." AllMusic rates the album 4.5 out of 5 stars and calls "Kid Charlemagne" and "Sign in Stranger" "true Steely Dan classics."

Incidentally, the album cover—a combination of a painting by Larry Zox and a photo by Charlie Ganse—was originally designed for Van Morrison's unreleased album , "Mechanical Bliss." In the liner notes for the 1999 remastered version, Fagen and Becker described it as "the ugliest album cover of the '70s, bar none—except maybe for 'Can't Buy a Thrill.'"

Analogue Productions now honors this masterful album with a sonically outstanding Hybrid SACD . The unique blend of rock, jazz, and funk, as well as the uncompromising approach to songwriting and production, make the Hybrid SACD of "The Royal Scam," remastered from the original tapes by Bernie Grundman, an absolute must-have for audiophiles and fans of the legendary duo!