Donald Fagen - Morph the Cat
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Music CD Cover
Artist: Donald FagenBrand: FAGEN,DONALD
Edition: Music CD
Audio: English (Original Language)
CD Release Date: 2006-03-14
Music Label: Reprise / Wea
Product features:
- FAGEN DONALD MORPH THE CAT
- Morph the Cat
- H Gang
- What I Do
- Brite Nitegown
- The Great Pagoda of Funn
- Security Joan
- The Night Belongs To Mona
- Mary Shut the Garden Door
- Morph the Cat (Reprise)
Free Music Notes for Morph the Cat
Free Music Review: The Modern Classic
Hit: 5 Stars
"The Modern Classic" is a phrase applied to any number marketed goods; it is a combination of words describing something's timelessness regardless of its being contemporary, and therefore, still facing the trials of time. Dubbing items a "modern classic" is a process that should be sparse in its applicaton, however you are likely to see this accolade placed on any number of undeserving products.
And then there is this number; Donald Fagen, universal master of the cool, releasing a solo album for the 21st Century. Now that the age of irony has come and (possibly) gone this album cannot be so easily branded a dinosaur rocker's output nor can it be upheld as the works of a prolific genius. The bar for what makes an album a classic one becomes increasingly high as the current milieu of comparable musical output is decreasingly low. "Morph the Cat", however, has all the markings of The Modern Classic in any number of criteria for the title. It is a new album that stands out as far superior the it's contemporaries, it exhibits a form that is indicative of classic, and, in additon, it catches an aesthetic of American music and imagery that can be suitably correllated to the American classic period.
A respected source for musical journalism recently referred to Gwen Stefani as the "boldest" pop star in a review of her latest recording. Granted, when you listen to today's top 40, Gwendolyn might stick out a little for her boisterouness or "experimental" (in the most explicitly populist ways) production technique, but other than that her iconoclasm in pop standards is restricted. But this example is not to cast aspersions on Miss Stefani, rather it is to show the liberality with which mundane musicians are overly praised. And here we have Mr. Fagen and "Morph the Cat"; the same unnamed music journalism source dogged Steely Dan's grammy winning "Two Against Nature" as a poor throwback album. I hope they were merely pitching a fork, because if they are not, than they have been duped into an existance of appreciation for sub-par performances.
"Morph the Cat" may not feature minimalist dance beats made on Pro-Tools nor will you find him tinkering with time signatures in an oh-so archaic plee of "Look at me, I'm innovative". No, Fagen here is working with a standard formula, but in doing so is standing out. Perhaps the most innovative action in todays blase field is to actually work on harnessing and perfecting a technique, which is what Fagen has dedicated a long career to. Some accredit the abandonment of traditional form to a need to constantly evolve; I accredit it to laziness on the part of upcomers more obsessed with what they, rather than their music, represent. On "What I Do" we find a nice little R&B number that is a dialogue between a young Donald Fagen and Ray Charles. It is a fitting ode as the album is steeped in the bewilderment of real rock 'n' roll. Donald Fagen is not a sentimental crooner, he is a salty piano-bar lamenter. Its a metaphor lost on the i-Pod generation, and thank god for that. On "Morph the Cat" Fagen rises above both the youthful musicians of the trendy scenes and the peers of his era who have fallen the way of telathons and piss poor duet albums.
As an album The Cat shows the craftwork of a true artist. A concept album about an amorphous cat-like blob that personifies New York city, it is pieced together in a way that few albums can match. Opening with a strutting bassline on the title track that immediately brings to mind urban hustle, it makes for an experience in music that can really encapsulate the listener. The title track and the ending and knot-tying reprise frame an album that is variegated in its characteristics. There is a little funk in "White Night Gown", some ballad in "Great Pagoda of Fun", and a lot of Steely Dan-ness in "Security Joan". The listener is introduced to characters who must be presented under different tones, and Fagen does so perfectly. The weaving jazz that underlies all of the pop and songyness is an extra layer of music that puts a setting to the person and the situation.
Craft is a word that cannot be over-stressed in describing "Morph the Cat". All who are familiar with Fagen technique should not be surprised by the obsessive attention paid to every delicate detal. Every little nuance is perfectly placed on the canvas. The shimmering chimes in the back of "Pagoda of Fun", the rising and falling scales of "Night Belongs to Joan", and the incomplete solos quietly backing the title track were all well thought out even though they appear as mere afterthoughts. The complete picture of this album is one ascribing to the benefits of craft, intelligence, and contemplation.
"Morph the Cat" is traditional even for a Fagen outing. Compared to '93's "Kamakiriad" it is much more rooted in traditional blues and jazz than the funk and slick-modern chill of that album. As a concept album about the Big Apple its form and content could not be more appropriate. There is no better way to capture the aesthetic quality of the conceptual City That Never Sleeps than by appealing to its most classic era. On "Morph the Cat" we really get the Rockafeller out of Rockafeller Center, the shake of the speakeasy is sensually close, and we all feel the adventure of the mammoth structure of tommorows city being erected. It transcends mere quality critiques when you begin to feel the classique with which it was constructed. No, I can't say this album captures the classic aesthetics of antiquity, but it does harken to Americas comparable period. It is great modern music that pays tribute to our vivacious past.
And so it should be taken that "Morph the Cat" is the modern classic not because alot of people will like it and remember it, but because it lives up to what it truly means to be a classic. Fagen has produced a magnum piece of music among a landscape of what is less than mediocre. The album is wrought with all the qualities of what it means to be an album and is a testament to producing good music centered around good ideas. "Morph the Cat" is a true piece of iconolast work because it tears down that highly praised tradition of futile evolution in a musicians sound. Sure, Donald shows he can evolve, but he doesn't do so by tying a bunch of slick (or sloppy) bells and whistles to his material, he does it by making it the best it can be.
Morph the Cat Poster
The first solo album in 13 years from Donald Fagen, Morph The Cat is another contemporary classic from half of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame duo Steely Dan. With Fagan's adventurous musical depth, uniquely layered lyrics and entertaining subject matter (from a conversation with the ghost of Ray Charles to a romantic liaison with an airport security guard named Joan), Morph the Cat is the newest chapter chronicling the most sophisticated music in rock.For all the delight their fans take in parsing their wry and obstinately obscure lyrics, Steely Dan wouldn't command the kind of following they have if they weren't such consummate craftsmen in shaping melodies, layering keyboard and guitar effects and applying sophisticated doses of jazz, funk and soul. On his own albums, of which Morph the Cat is only the third--and the first since 1993's Kamakiriad--the group's sardonic co-mastermind Donald Fagen avails himself to more socially observant and personally revealing themes. But here, too, it's the music's dark shimmer and bumptious grooves that get under your skin, carrying his serious intentions with them. The grandly allusive "Morph," named after what Fagen describes as a "vast, ghostly cat-thing" that hovers in the Manhattan sky (not unlike Woody Allen's catty mother in "New York Stories"), reflects with no loss of irony or oblique meaning on the angst and sense of loss felt in the post-9/11 world. There are visions of death--including his own--and political oppression. There's a comic romantic encounter with a female airport security guard and a reverent faceoff with the ghost of Ray Charles, whose essence is nailed: "Well, you bring some church but you leave no doubt/As to what kind of love you love to shout about." Even when Fagen's hipster sensibility flirts with preciousness, the music is so richly, radiantly alive, the collective power of the songs can't be denied. --Lloyd Sachs
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