Donald Fagen - The Nightfly (1982)

I've been a huge Steely Dan fan since the early '70s, wearing out the grooves of such early classics as 'Countdown to Ecstasy' and 'Pretzel Logic' through glorious overplay. So, when Dan's main man Donald Fagen came out with his solo album in the early '80s, I went out and bought a US-pressed copy of the LP... no, make that two!

This is what sophisticated pop should sound like — smart, soulful, slick in just the right way — and more than two decades after its release, it sounds fresher and bouncier than the pulp pop churned out by the super-greedy Big Music Factory (hey, shouldn't they move production to China like everybody else to cut costs or something?).