02/05/2026
On this day in 1977, the Steely Dan LP “The Royal Scam” re-entered the UK Albums Chart at #52 (February 5)
Originally released in 1976, Steely Dan’s fifth album did best in New Zealand, where it peaked at #3, also going to #11 in the UK, #14 in the Netherlands, #15 in the US, #24 in Canada, and #30 in Australia.
The lead single and opening track on the album, "Kid Charlemagne", was loosely inspired by the rise and fall of the San Francisco-based L*D chemist Owsley Stanley, and Larry Carlton's guitar solo on the song was ranked #80 in a 2008 list of the 100 greatest guitar solos by Rolling Stone.
“It’s my claim to fame,” Carlton told Guitar World in 1981.
“I did maybe two hours worth of solos that we didn’t keep. Then I played the first half of the intro, which they loved, so they kept that.
I punched in for the second half. So it was done in two parts and the solo that fades out in the end was done in one pass.”
The song “Everything You Did" (3rd track on side 2), features the lyric: "Turn up the Eagles, the neighbors are listening."
Eagles legend Glenn Frey offered his ideas on the lyric, saying: "Apparently, Walter Becker's girlfriend loved the Eagles, and she played them all the time. I think it drove him nuts.
So, the story goes that they were having a fight one day and that was the genesis of the line."
Later in 1976, in a nod back to Steely Dan for the free publicity, and inspired by the group's lyrical style, the Eagles included the line: "They stab it with their steely knives but they just can't kill the beast", in their hit song "Hotel California".
Frey explained: "We just wanted to allude to Steely Dan rather than mentioning them outright, so 'Dan' got changed to 'knives', which is still, you know, a pe**le metaphor."
The two bands shared a manager (Irving Azoff) and Timothy B. Schmit, who sang backing vocals on The Royal Scam, joined the Eagles in 1977.
There’s the usual collection of excellent musicians contributing, including Steely Dan founder Denny Dias, who guests on guitar, while the raft of backup vocalists includes the likes of Michael McDonald and Venetta Fields.
The album’s cover was meant as a satirical take on the "American Dream".
Artist Larry Zox originally created the painting of the skyscraper/beast hybrids for an unreleased Van Morrison album, and designer Ed Caraeff suggested superimposing a photograph of a sleeping vagrant taken by Charlie Ganse to make the cover for “The Royal Scam”.
In the liner notes for the 1999 remastered reissue of the album, Fagen and Becker jokingly called it "the most hideous album cover of the seventies, bar none (excepting perhaps Can't Buy a Thrill)." 😁
Click on the link below to watch a live performance of "Kid Charlemagne":
https://youtu.be/Sz-AHdx1GmM?si=XdbXoL9VkavrURLa
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