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Denny Dias | |
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| Birth name | Dennis Dias |
| Born | December 12, 1946 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Genres | Rock, jazz |
| Occupation(s) | Musician |
| Instrument(s) | Guitar |
| Labels | ABC Records |
Dennis Dias (born December 12, 1946) is an American guitarist, best known for being a founding member of Steely Dan.
Dias was working with his own band out of his garage in Hicksville, New York, when he placed an ad in The Village Voice [1] in the summer of 1970 that read: "Looking for keyboardist and bassist. Must have jazz chops! Assholes need not apply". [2] Donald Fagen and Walter Becker responded to the advertisement.
They joined his band and immediately began playing their own material. Dias fired the rest of the band, and the three of them moved to California, adding drummer Jim Hodder, guitarist Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, and vocalist David Palmer before recording for ABC/Dunhill Records as Steely Dan. Dias recorded as a permanent member of the band on 1972's Can't Buy a Thrill (with an electric sitar solo on the song "Do It Again"), on 1973's Countdown to Ecstasy , and on 1974's Pretzel Logic .
Following a tour promoting Pretzel Logic, Becker and Fagen decided to break the band up and use session musicians on future albums. Though no longer a member of the band, Dias continued to work with them as a session guitarist, appearing on 1975's Katy Lied , 1976's The Royal Scam , and 1977's Aja . In 1991 he joined Toto on their Summer Festival Tour. He also recorded with Wayne Shorter, Wilfrido Vargas and Pete Christlieb. Some of Dias's original material was recorded on a 1999 CD called Matter of Time, with Lisa Jason (Vocals) and Andy Bergsten (Bass) as the core of the band.[ citation needed ]
In 2014, he was playing with Denny Dias and Friends, a Boston-based band formed with Lisa Jason and Andy Bergsten with session musicians from around the country. In 2015, they planned a tour that included the Iridium in NYC.[ citation needed ]
With Steely Dan
With others
Steely Dan is an American pop rock band founded in 1971 in New York by Walter Becker and Donald Fagen. Originally having a full band lineup, by the end of 1974 Becker and Fagen chose to stop playing live and continue Steely Dan as a studio-only duo, utilising a revolving cast of session musicians. Rolling Stone has called them "the perfect musical antiheroes for the seventies".
Jeffrey Allen "Skunk" Baxter is an American guitarist, known for his stints in the rock bands Steely Dan and The Doobie Brothers during the 1970s and Spirit in the 1980s. More recently, he has worked as a defense consultant and advised U.S. members of Congress on missile defense. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of The Doobie Brothers in 2020.
Pretzel Logic is the third studio album by American rock band Steely Dan, released by ABC Records on February 20, 1974. It was recorded at the Village Recorder in West Los Angeles, California, with producer Gary Katz. The album was Steely Dan's last to be made and released while the group was still an active touring band, as well as the final album to feature the band's full quintet-lineup of Becker, Fagen, Denny Dias, Jim Hodder, and Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, though it also features significant contributions from many prominent Los Angeles-based studio musicians.
Donald Jay Fagen is an American musician who was the co-founder, lead singer, co-songwriter, and keyboardist of the band Steely Dan, formed in the early 1970s with musical partner Walter Becker. In addition to his work with Steely Dan, Fagen has released four solo albums, beginning with The Nightfly in 1982, which was nominated for seven Grammys.
Walter Carl Becker was an American musician, songwriter, and record producer. He was the co-founder, guitarist, bassist, and co-songwriter of the jazz rock band Steely Dan.
Can't Buy a Thrill is the debut studio album by American rock band Steely Dan, released by ABC Records in November 1972. It was written by band members Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, and recorded in August 1972 at the Village Recorder in Los Angeles with producer Gary Katz. The album is one of Steely Dan's most stylistically eclectic, encompassing the sounds of soft rock, folk rock, jazz-rock and pop, alongside philosophical, elliptical lyrics.
Aja is the sixth studio album by the American jazz rock band Steely Dan, released by ABC Records on September 23, 1977. On the album, band leaders Donald Fagen and Walter Becker pushed Steely Dan further into experimenting with different combinations of session players, enlisting the services of nearly 40 musicians, while pursuing longer, more sophisticated compositions and arrangements.
Countdown to Ecstasy is the second studio album by American rock band Steely Dan, released by ABC Records in July 1973. It was recorded at the Village Recorder in West Los Angeles, California, except for Rick Derringer's slide guitar part for "Show Biz Kids", which was recorded at Caribou Ranch in Nederland, Colorado. After the departure of vocalist David Palmer from Steely Dan, the group recorded the album with Donald Fagen singing lead on every track.
Katy Lied is the fourth studio album by American rock band Steely Dan, released by ABC Records in March 1975; reissues have been released by MCA Records since ABC Records was acquired by MCA in 1979. It was the first album the group made after they stopped touring, as well as their first to feature backing vocals by Michael McDonald.
The Royal Scam is the fifth studio album by American rock band Steely Dan, released by ABC Records in 1976; reissues have been released by MCA Records since ABC Records was acquired by MCA in 1979. It was produced by Gary Katz. In the United States, the album peaked at number 15 on the Billboard Top LPs & Tape chart, and it has been certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).
Jim Hodder was an American drummer, best known as an early member of Steely Dan. After leading the Boston-based group The Bead Game, Hodder moved to Los Angeles to join the first lineup of Steely Dan. He appeared on their first three albums before leaving the group in 1974. He worked as a session musician before his 1990 death.
Roger Scott Nichols was an American recording engineer, producer, and inventor.
The discography for the American jazz rock band Steely Dan consists of nine studio albums, twenty one singles, two live albums, one live set on DVD, seven compilations and one box set in the United States. The band was originally active from 1971 to 1981 and later reformed in 1993 and continued to release studio and live material up to today.
Gold is a compilation album by Steely Dan, released in 1982. It mostly comprises hits both post-dating and not included on their 1978 Greatest Hits, essentially acting as "Volume 2"; it also features additional album tracks, offering a broad perspective on the band's career to that point.
The Best of Steely Dan: Then and Now is a compilation album by Steely Dan, released in 1993. The album cover is a photograph of Carhenge in Nebraska.
"Pretzel Logic" is a song written by Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, released as a single by Steely Dan from their album Pretzel Logic, originally in 1974 by ABC Records. It reached number 57 in the Billboard charts.
"Any Major Dude Will Tell You" is a song written by Donald Fagen and Walter Becker that was first released by Steely Dan on their 1974 album Pretzel Logic. It was also released as the B-side of the first single from that album "Rikki Don't Lose That Number". It was later released on several of the band's compilation albums.
"Aja" is a jazz rock song, with elements of jazz fusion and progressive rock, by the American rock band Steely Dan from the album of the same name, their sixth studio album, released in 1977. Composers Becker and Fagen play guitar and synthesizer, respectively, with studio musicians playing the other parts. Fagen sings lead vocals. Production duties were handled by Gary Katz; the album was released through ABC Records. Musically, it is tonally sophisticated and a structurally complex work that was praised upon release as the most ambitious track the duo had ever attempted. The song's lyrics voice the interior monologue of a man who runs to the title character to escape the stresses of his life "up on the hill." Fagen claimed that it was inspired by the relative of an acquaintance, who had married a Korean woman named Aja. He has described the song as being about the "tranquility that can come of a quiet relationship with a beautiful woman."
"Dirty Work" is a song written by Donald Fagen and Walter Becker of Steely Dan, which appeared on the band's 1972 debut album Can't Buy a Thrill.
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