Rating: 
Summary: For Fans' Eyes Only
Review: Impossible to write the whys and wherefors of what goes on in an artist's mind without actually interviewing the artist. We know Steely Dan are quirky, sarcatic, cynical and can compose a beautiful tune. I think one reviewer compared their music to a velvet glove wrapped around a brass-knuckled hand. Be that as it may, Dan fans will eat this stuff up (I did) It's mostly a compilation of published and bradcast interviews with a little heresay thown in for good measure. Ironically, Brian Sweet criticizes a 1979 or 1980 Time magazine article for not actually interviewing Becker or Fagen. He doesn't either!
Rating: 
Summary: This book is thorough but poorly written.
Review: It is ironic that an account of the Steely Dan phenomenon is documented by someone whose writing skills are negligable. Becker and Fagen, two contemporary literary masters by most standards, would find it strangely fitting, I suppose. Sweet's saving grace is his penchant for detail. His tome has the stories for which every avid Dan fan hungers. Recording sessions, writing sessions, band reformulations, personal melodramas, etc. These elements make it enjoyable reading, especially when accompanied by revisitations to the legendary recordings. Listening to the CD's while making one's chronological journey through this book, is distictly thrilling, as well as eye(ear)-opening. The lack of an index and of footnotes limits this volume's usefulness as a reference source however. It would be nice to see a similar effort made by a writer who posesses a similar creative energy, quirkiness and skill to that of Becker and Fagen themselves.
Rating:
Summary: Sloppy, Obsessive account of great American Band
Review: Steely Dan are noted for their exacting and meticulous recording style. Unfortunately 'Reeling In The Years' by Brian Sweet is written in almost the complete opposite of Steely Dan's style. Long on gossip and hazy recollections by Steely Dan alumni Sweet's account never gives us what we want: Steely Dan! After informing us that he could not get any interviews with either of Steely Dan's principals Walter Becker or Donald Fagen in his preface, ("for reasons best known only to themselves, Becker and Fagen, declined to be interviewed despite several earnest requests."),Sweet then spends the next 36 pages detailing Fagen's childhood (but not Becker's), the songwriters school days at Bard College and then a long study of a terrible film the duo wrote the score for in 1971 ('You Gotta Walk It, Like You Talk It'..so bad that it's never been aired on tv). One of the things that die hard 'Dan fans hoped for before this book came out was a detailed account of how and when the group came into being when they were signed by ABC Dunhill Records in 1971. Despite lots of details and a plethora of non-source credited quotes (in fact none of the quotes in the entire book are sourced!)the reader will still come away somewhat confused as to how the original group (which toured for three years) was first assembled. Sweet himself seems confused, on p. 40 he states that Denny Dias, a longtime guitarist for the band, was the first to join the band. Five pages later he states that the group had already recorded and released their first songs before Dias had "yet to arrive in California." Aside from compiling a sloppy chronology Sweet gives off obsessive tones with comments like "What more do they want?" as he demands they release a new album in his introduction. Later he takes on the roll of psychologist with, "Fagen seemed to be blaming his parents and the American lifestyles in the Fifties for his thirtysomething creative problems." What lifestyles of the 1950's were a! ffecting Fagen some 30 years later one can only guess but Sweet seems confident in telling us the true psyche of this person he's never interviewed. Now I don't blame all of these faults with the book on the writer..... But what you get is a half baked account, slapped together (complete with a picture of Donald Fagen in kindergarten)for a quick buck....maybe Fagen and Becker are saving their version of the Steely Dan story for Hollywood!....I can see it 'Steely Dan: The Trip We Made To Hollywood..(and back)!
Rating:
Summary: Great info, poorly written
Review: This biography of Walter Becker and Donald Fagan is loaded with interesting information about the lives and near maniacal recording practices of Steely Dan. I believe this is the pretty much the only biography of Steeley Dan available and as a huge fan I could not put the book down. Note, however, that great literature this is not. The book is extremly poorly written, bordering on offensive at times, but the content more than makes up for it.
Rating:
Summary: Sign in Stranger
Review: This book is a keeper for any Dan Fan. Contrary to some of the other reviews here, I would like to have learned even more personal information about the "mystery men" behind, in my humble opinion, the "Coolest Group Ever." Their lives and personal relationships, when not involving their music, is glossed over, almost as an afterthought. It was interesting, however, to get a glimpse of what in the world some of their songs are really about and how my original interpretation differed. This book may be, in some respects, a lightweight. But for the true-blue Dan Fan, it's the only game in town.
Rating:
Summary: Sign in Stranger
Review: This book is a keeper for any Dan Fan. Contrary to some of the other reviews here, I would like to have learned even more personal information about the "mystery men" behind, in my humble opinion, the "Coolest Group Ever." Their lives and personal relationships, when not involving their music, is glossed over, almost as an afterthought. It was interesting, however, to get a glimpse of what in the world some of their songs are really about and how my original interpretation differed. This book may be, in some respects, a lightweight. But for the true-blue Dan Fan, it's the only game in town.
Rating:
Summary: Where DID you get those shoes?
Review: This book is compelling reading for the serious Steely Dan fan. However, one must take it with a grain of salt, as the dynamic duo weren't involved in the book project at all. The mystique of Becker and Fagen represent part of their attraction, after all, and their legendary reclusiveness permeates this book. This reader noted a few glaring errors in grammar, and perhaps typos, but considering it's British authoring, it may be correct as far as the King's English goes. A good read nonetheless...I am glad I read it, however, as it seems to answer some of the nagging questions all Dan fans ask. Buy it with confidenc, but don't expect too much.
Rating:
Summary: Fans will like it...critics will hate it.
Review: This book is informative, with some great photos and stories, but it has to be taken in the spirit in which it was written. The author admits not interviewing the principals during the course of writing this book, and has to rely on a lot of second hand information. For this reason, one can not take everything too seriously. There were a few grammatical errors in the text as well, but considering the author was based in the U.K., I don't really know what may be correct in their determination. I found it an informative and entertaining book, but it would have been better to hear from Donald and Walter in the first person.
Rating:
Summary: Bodacious Indeed
Review: This book written by a man who publishes a UK-based fanzine about Steely Dan goes a long way in explaining the lives and times of the two men responsible for the band, Walter Becker and Donald Fagen. While other reviewers of this book may complain that neither of them were interviewed for this book (not that Becker & Fagen would have anyway, given their notorious dislike for interviews), Brian Sweet still does a fine job in detailing the band's history and the "bios" of both men. It's interesting to read about the things going on during the recording of the Dan's early albums, numerous stories and anecdotes are contained in the book; and also the personality "quirks" of Becker & Fagen. Also interesting are the supposed meanings behind so many of the group's cryptic lyrics. While it's nice to have some sort of idea what a song is based on, too much interpretation will only drive you crazy in the long run (at least in my opinion). The book continues on through the "breakup" of Steely Dan in 1981, the "drought" that any 'Dan' fan suffered through the 80s as Becker & Fagen found other creative projects to work on and the joy we all felt when we found out the "band" was back together in the early 1990s. While this updated edition of the 1994 release doesn't really tell too much about what the guys have been doing since '94, it does give a good history up to that point. I feel after having read this book that now I have some small sense of what Becker and Fagen are like. Any Steely Dan fan who wants to learn more about the band's history should go out and grab this book if they haven't done so already.
Rating: 
Summary: Steely Dan: Gosssip, a history but no Fagen or Becker
Review: While British author Brian Sweet should be commended for compiling the first ever account of Steely Dan in book form, the publishers should have realized that Sweet was not a first rate author. Or a writer in the usual sense..he was the creator of a sloppy fanzine that even to diehard Steely Dan fans was both obsessive and idiotic. Omnibus perhaps should have subtitled this 'A Britsh fans' view of Steely Dan' for it is quite ironic that Steely Dan, perhaps the most American of all the great 1970's bands, has yet to be recognized by the US rock historians. While Sweet does fill in some of the holes in the early Steely saga he spends too much time on banal trivia, is it really important that we know what color tie Fagen & Becker's first manager was wearing when he met them? Did we really need a picture of Donny Fagen age 12? The publishers should have realized that they had hired an adoring
fan of the composers and not a writer or researcher. My father said that you can always
judge a book by its index and bibliography...this book has neither...no index + no bibliography= sloppy writing...Steely Dan deserve better.
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