Walter Becker and Donald Fagen of Steely Dan in July 2009.Photo:Jean-Christophe Bott/Keystone/AP
Jean-Christophe Bott/Keystone/AP
“Dan fans” have a new reason to be delighted.
A newSteely Danvault track has resurfaced thanks to Steely Dan’s longtime engineer Roger Nichols.
The newly-discovered track is a short jingle that was made for the beer company Schlitz, “during the eight-month gap betweenCan’t Buy a ThrillandCountdown to Ecstasy,” per editor and writer Jake Malooley’sExpanding DanSubstack, which features original interviews, oral histories and audio stories about Steely Dan.
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“It was soon after ‘Reelin’ in the Years’ that someone called and asked if the guys would write a song for the Schlitz commercial,” Gary Katz, the band’s longtime producer, told Malooley. “And as I remember it, Donald [Fagen] said, ‘OK, but we’re gonna write it.’ By which he meant, they didn’t want to do a commercial somebody else wrote.”
Co-founding guitarist Jeff “Skunk” Baxter, added, “The band was still pretty young in its career, so everybody was reaching out for whatever opportunities there were."
Known as “The Schlitz Jingle,” the track runs just under two minutes, featuring a jazz fusion beat, with Fagen singing, “Once around life / Once around livin’ / Once around beer / And you’ll keep around Schlitz.”
From left: Jeff ‘Skunk’ Baxter, Walter Becker, David Palmer, Denny Dias, Donald Fagen and Jim Hodder of Steely Dan in 1972.Michael Ochs Archives/Getty
Michael Ochs Archives/Getty
At the time of its release, the track had a limited shelf life. The beer brand, which was sold to Pabst in 1999, shelved the band’s jingle because of their use of the Spanish word for “grab,” or “take,” because “coger"is also a slang term for sexual intercourse. “If I were the Schlitz company,” said Baxter, “I would contact Donald Fagen and pay him a million dollars to do another one.”
The release of “The Schlitz Jingle” comes just weeks after “The Second Arrangement” — another buried Steely Dan track — that resurfaced.
source: people.com
