A while ago, I heard a song on WXPN from Donald Fagen's new solo album, Morph the Cat. Not surprisingly, you could probably stick the song in the middle of Side B of any given Steely Dan record and few people would be able to tell the difference. It got me thinking about Fagen and Steely Dan.
First of all, why bother making a solo album when it sounds exactly like the band you're already in? Solo albums, especially those made by members of a band that is still together (which, as far as I know, Steely Dan still is, having won an "Album of the Year" Grammy not too long ago), are generally good times to explore departures and new angles that wouldn't work within the band context. If you make solo albums that sound different from what you've done before, you're Paul Simon (at least Paul Simon through about 1990): exciting and interesting even in your failures. If you make solo albums that sound exactly like all of your previous work, you're Ben Folds: boring and predictable.
Of course, Steely Dan has never been about exploring new territory with each release. Granted, I've only heard a couple albums in full, and a selected smattering of songs from other ones, but they all sound pretty much identical: smooth, jazzy, groove-oriented, and spotlessly produced (one of my professors was so impressed by the production on Aja that he recommended everybody in the class buy a copy to use to test sound systems; consequently, that's the only Steely Dan record I actually own). I've heard that defended the same way people defend the retro-jazz of Wynton Marsalis: that it's not about innovation, it's about "perfection of the craft." It's about improving incrementally, and eventually reaching nirvana, or something like that.
Of course, I'm not really hearing any incremental improvements in Steely Dan, or in the new Donald Fagen song I heard, because, as I've mentioned several times now, they all sound exactly the same to me. And I happen to think that Wynton Marsalis sucks too. At least Steely Dan has a unique sound, and one that wasn't perfected decades before they started, which is more than I can say for Marsalis. (To be fair to Mr. Marsalis, I haven't heard any of his latter-day stuff when he supposedly "found his own voice," which I take to mean "stopped shamelessly imitating Miles Davis.")
Anyway, if you ask me, Donald Fagen belongs in a category with bands like Stereolab: they probably couldn't sound different even if they tried, and whether or not you need to buy any new release is determined only by your appetite for that sound. Which is why I own only one Steely Dan record. That's pretty much all I need.
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