Fagen realised he was different from everyone else at just ten years old, a time when his parents made the life-altering decision to move the family from their hometown of Passaic, New Jersey, to Kendall Park, a meticulously planned suburb in south Brunswick. The relocation deeply unsettled the young Fagen, who loathed the monotony and sterile atmosphere of their new environment. He felt trapped, as though imprisoned, and from that moment onward, he lost trust in his parents’ judgement. However, this experience proved to be a defining moment, laying the foundation for his distinctive cynicism and sharp, singular worldview.

Luckily for Fagen, he wasn’t the only one who had lost faith in his elders. It was the late 1950s, and the youthful rock ‘n’ roll revolution was kicking into gear. It provided an escape from the inertia of Kendall Park and was perfect for his active imagination, inspiring him to get out of there.

In another stroke of providence, Fagen wasn’t the only one in his family subverting convention. At the age of 11, his older cousin Barbara, a beatnik—the forerunner of the hippies—recommended he try jazz music. While jazz was the genre of artistic accomplishment, subversion, and heroin—a firmly adult world—this burgeoning countercultural space supplied Fagen with the sanctuary he’d long searched for. 

In an instant, Fagen dropped rock ‘n’ roll and, at such a young age, became a jazz elitist, enamoured by its excitement and refinement.  Significantly, this is what he would later state inspired his “anti-social personality”, the throughline of Steely Dan’s work. Remarkably, and in a reflection of how times have changed, he even attended the Newport Jazz Festival when pre-pubescent. 

Then, at the age of 12, Young would thrust himself deeper into the world of jazz and travelled via bus to Manhattan’s influential jazz hub, Village Vanguard. Feeding a string of formative experiences, he would watch the genre’s greats in action, such as Miles Davis, Thelonius Monk, Sonny Rollins, and Charles Mingus. This crystallised his affinity with the form. 

While this would be most clear in his jazz-fusion efforts with Steely Dan, Fagen’s 1982 debut solo album, The Nightfly, is brimming with the influence of such figures. The autobiographical lyrics about his suburban upbringing heightened this feeling. 

In a 1983 interview, Fagen discussed the fantastical imagination he had when young, which provided an escape from the suburbs. Comparing his work to that of Steven Spielberg’s own tales of suburban ennui, he said “the alien in my bedroom” – referring to ET – was not from out of space but Thelonious Monk.

Fagen said: “Steven Spielberg makes movies about the suburbs and seems comfortable with them, but I detested the suburbs I lived in. He has his fantasies, I had mine – I think Thelonious Monk was the alien in my bedroom, rather than a little guy from outer space.”

For the young Fagen, both Monk and Miles Davis were his icons. Their work was more than enough for him to flee the real world and lose himself in jazz. It wouldn’t be long before he adopted the beatnik look, including black turtlenecks, and became such a snob that he wouldn’t have many friends.

from https://faroutmagazine.co.uk