Michael McDonald keeps rememberin'
The singer-songwriter turned memoirist recalls his audition for Steely Dan, the quirks of touring with Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, singing on "Peg," and more.
Over the past couple weeks, Michael McDonald has been inescapable. Even more ubiquitous, it seems, than he was in the early 1980s, when his distinctive voice could be heard on virtually every third song played on the radio, and SCTV’s Rick Moranis (a Steely Dan superfan himself) could confidently hang an entire sketch on McDonald’s sheer omnipresence.
The Yachtfather has been takin’ it to the streets, so to speak, to promote his new memoir, What a Fool Believes. Along with his co-author, the actor and memoirist Paul Reiser, McDonald has made recent appearances on the Today show and The Tonight Show, during which the man who lived the life chronicled in the book handles the storytelling while comedian Reiser interjects dad jokes. McDonald also spoke at length in an interview with NPR’s Fresh Air. Not to be outdone, People magazine has published no less than seven so-called exclusives on the book, including one that carried the headline “Michael McDonald Is ‘Always Flattered’ When Music Fans Are Surprised That He’s White (Exclusive).”
For its piece on What a Fool Believes, The New York Times managed to wrangle a glowing quote from Mr. Steely Dan himself, Donald Fagen. “There was a serious discussion about whether [McDonald] should replace me as the lead singer, which would have been my personal preference,” Fagen wrote in an email. “But, for some dumb reason, I was voted down. I didn’t insist, and I’ve regretted it ever since. I mean, here’s this monster singer and musician, and he’s also really funny and a sweetheart of a guy. What’s not to like?”
The same question could be asked of McDonald’s book. For a singer-songwriter who titled his second solo album No Lookin’ Back, the 72-year-old now views his past—his avoidant tendencies, his substance-abuse issues—with an unsparing clarity rarely found in rock memoirs. Still, it’s never not fun to ride shotgun as McDonald rises from gigging club musician to Doobie Brother par excellence to snowy-haired yacht rock avatar.
Back in March, I detailed the book’s many tales of McDonald’s adventures with Steely Dan, from his and Walter Becker’s cursed stab at dealing cocaine to McDonald’s struggle to adequately sing background on “Doctor Wu” during the recording of Katy Lied. Now, at the risk of piling on, I give you my own interview with Mr. McD, from which I’ve quoted in the past but have never published in full. He discusses his impromptu audition for Steely Dan, the peculiarities of touring with the band in the mid-’70s, and Becker and Fagen’s discovery of an “eerie” use for his one-of-a-kind voice.