Walter Becker

“If you're playing in a room that holds 15,000 people, it's just a question of how bad the room acoustics are and in what way they're bad.”

“I have a feeling there were many, many successful rock duos that just didn't get attention. That's the fault of the rock press. They are always playing up controversy, scandal, aggravation,...”

“We opened for the Kinks, the Beach Boys, the Guess Who, Chuck Berry, Sha Na Na. We opened for Cheech and Chong - I opened for Cheech, and Don opened for Chong.”

“I think what television and video games do is reminiscent of drug addiction. There's a measure of reinforcement and a behavioural loop.”

“I love guys like Charlie Parker.”

“With 'Aja,' there was a sort of happy conjunction between our tastes and the backgrounds and styles of studio musicians at the time.”

“The protagonist in 'Deacon Blues' is a triple-L loser - an L-L-L Loser. It's not so much about a guy who achieves his dream but about a broken dream of a broken man living a broken life.”

“'Deacon Blues' was special for me. It's the only time I remember mixing a record all day and, when the mix was done, feeling like I wanted to hear it over and over again. It was the comprehe...”

“What about that Dave Brubeck live album, with a version of 'Like Someone in Love' on it, and long sax solos by Paul Desmond? That's what got me hooked on jazz.”

“When the first album came out and I heard 'Do It Again' on the radio, that was the greatest thing that had ever happened. After that, it was all downhill.”

“There are some things that I write that I know are personal in a way, or the gag is so obscure that it's just for me, and there's other things that could basically be for anybody or be anyth...”

“I thought Twitter was a joke. I really thought it was a gag. I thought it was like National Lampoon or the Onion.”

“It's great fun to play with a really good band.”

“Originally, we had a band known as Steely Dan. As we moved away from the band, we got whoever was appropriate for specific tunes. In a lot of cases, we gravitated toward jazz players who had...”

“I think we're right up there with Herman's Hermits and the other greats. Maybe somewhere between Herman's Hermits and the Gershwins.”

“I can never believe how much time and energy and money and talent and everything else is being poured into horrible ideas.”

“We play rock & roll, but we swing when we play. We want that ongoing flow, that lightness, that forward rush of jazz.”

“I think the audience for Limp Bizkit is probably not going to be particularly interested in what we're doing. I don't think they'll find much that satisfies them in what we do.”

“From a linguistic point of view, you can't really take much objection to the notion that a show is a show is a show.”

“Given a choice between Charlie Mingus and Eric Dolphy or Joe Strummer and Lou Reed, there was no choice. I like Reed and Strummer, but it's kiddie music.”