"I don't care fuck him." LMAO! Donald's great.

LOVE Donald in the his interview!

When the Don tells you what jazz is, you listen lol. Him and Walter crafted the best jazz sounds of the 70s, and influenced multiple generations of artist (including mega-cohorts like Joni Mitchell). Such a classic, clean sound, and a level of production few, if any, bands could reach in the 1970s. They were that meticulous with albums like Aja, which sounds just as amazing today as it did in '77.

I always saw Whiplash as a bullshit but highly entertaining sports film in the world of a jazz conservatory. I quote it with my friends all the time

Totally awesome. Don't mince words, Donald. Tell us what you really feel.

My lasting living Idol. Donald Fagen is and has always been the man.

This is awesome. DF has a deep understanding of and respect for the musical giants that came before him. Not every musician does.

I had a music teacher that wasn't that extreme as the Whiplash one, but he was dreadful to the point I decided to quit music. Then I came back and left for other reasons, but, truth be told, bad music teachers like that, pompous, narcissistic, pretentious, abusive, and non empathetic exist. Not everything is flowers and rainbows in the music ed schools as movies as Fame make us believe. I'd love to hear Donald's technical reasons about his dislike for the movie.

I was in shock when they showed it to the year seven music students at the school that I teach at. It’s such a cruel movie but most of the musicians I’ve met in my professional career have been great.

This makes me so happy.

Don't sugar-coat it, Donald. What do you REALLY think?😅

I miss Steely Dan without Walter Becker it isn’t the same.Lol what a funny interview.😂

Respect to Donald for having the balls to speak his mind..... heaven forbid anyone should be truthful these days!!

D. F. is amazing and a true genius and perfectionist! ♫ ♪ ♫ ♪ ♫ I hope I get to meet him one day. A major hero dude for me.

I get where Don’s coming from, but I think he missed the point. The fact that Whiplash revolves around intense, collegiate jazz competitions shows what happens when an art form is forced into a sports-like environment. The teacher character is constantly pining for his great player but he’ll never find that because that kind of talent doesn’t blossom under such brute force. As a jazz drummer I of course see how silly parts of the movie are, especially when the kid’s hands start bleeding from too much practice, but I think Don’s being a little too critical. The director, Damien Chazelle, was himself a drummer for a big band in music school and interacted with hard ass teachers who valued perfection over expression. Maybe I’m the one who got it wrong, who knows?

Wow this is great I think I will check out the full interview!

This makes me so happy! All I could think when I sat through 5 grueling minutes of Whiplash was "Full Metal Jacket meets Drum Line." I wonder if this was in fact the elevator pitch.

LOVE YOU FOREVER, DF

God keep blessing this man and RIP Mr Becker . Thank you for showing us how amazing music can be .

Great. Now I have to watch, "Whiplash".

Why is everyone upset about this movie?

There are definitely teachers like that

So funny to hear The Donald. He and Walter drove the very best studio musicians to tears on those recording sessions in the 70s. Even the great Jeff Porcaro could barely cut it on the Gaucho sessions, he ended up getting replaced with a drum machine. Same with Mark Knopfler, those two put him through 10 hours of recording for a few seconds of music on Time out of mind.

Yes!!! The most honest opinion ever about DC.

Donald Fagan keeps it real!!

I really enjoyed Whiplash. I don't take movies seriously.

I'm far from a jazz aficionado the closest I get is...Steely Dan. But I've seen science fiction movies that have a more believable premise than the presentation of Jazz in Whiplash

Right on I totally agree with your narrative. Whiplash's neurotic interpretation, clueless to the reality of the jazz genre origin is without a doubt the most limited version of what Jazz is, stands for and how it has grown through time, on the importance of the impact their creators made on a universal cultural plane and ultimately the personal freedom it provides for its artists and followers on a global world stage. Quality control is definite one of today's main ailing issues unfortunately ignored inspite of how it effects what (we think) we eat, how medicine does more bad than good for our health and on how are thought process has been taken over by marketing fantasy claims, fake news and false propaganda. Modern music educación is a post Jazz phenomena construct that appeared after an extended period mixed root brewing that gave birth to Jazz in the eatly 19th Century as a remarkably, fertil, thriving word of mouth musical tradition.

Haha! Great attitude Man! As Zappa once said, “Jazz ain’t dead, it just smells funny” So, let’s have fun 🤩🎶 Spot on!

I love his take on La La Land fuck that movie lol

What was the reference to Fred Armisen about?

I loved that movie, but I’ll listen to what fagen says, since he and Walter Becker really pioneered their genre of music.

Fagan yet again bringing out his inner Miles.

As much as I love Steely Dan, based on his reputation from other bandmates, Fagen is more like Fletcher than he realizes.

Love donald but man this is the epitome of jazz-elitism that keeps so many people away from the genre. You have to “get it” to be able to enjoy it- what a joke lol. Of course to fagen this isn’t his idea of jazz but that’s not the point of the film, it’s a wonderful movie so you shouldn’t feel bad for liking it if u do. I guess the man truly is a cynic at heart and that’s why we love him.

He's gangsta.

Si hubiera tenido un maestro como el de whiplash, le hubiera roto los huesos a patadas... ni un diente le quedaba..

🤣😂🤣😂 The DON!!

hum had to listen again, ya you know Donald Fagen is truly one of the great songwriters in our time and i can honestly understand where he's coming from in his experiences and the things he has been through and a real understanding that is very in-depth and real awsome you know like the dukes, hum this is for real and lov him and all the rollers, WINDY

It’s the same reason true fans of Batman hate the Dark Knight. It’s a really great film but it doesn’t really understand the fundamentals of a Batman story past the very surface level.

Whiplash was so bad and so offensive that I can’t even watch that guy’s insurance commercials anymore.

I love Dan Fagen. Steely Dan was always my favorite because their music was smart.

Nimby rant. Still love him though.

I’ve found that anyone who knows anything about music, ie, Steve Gadd, Rick Beato, have had the same opinion of that film as Fagen

I actually really like the movie...however Donald's take is really funny! Someone like him only becomes the songwriter he is from having very strong views on things!

In addition to the Jazz critiques here, the plot made no sense to me. The teacher was trying to ruin the student's performance at end of the film. If he succeeded it would have reflected on the teacher's own standing. Also, it was corny that the teacher went from sabotage to encouragement mid song.

I get what you all are saying, but when I saw it I thought "oh this guy is the Vince Lombardi of music teachers. When you talk to the ol Green Bay Packer greats back then, all of them would say they hated him at practice and the game BUT all of them cried the hardest at his funeral. That was just the part that was never shown in the movie. That this teacher saw the greatness in this kid but would never acknowledge it, always pushing and never allowing any complacency to set in order for this kid to see for himself just how great he could be. But like I said that was the part of the movie not written.

it's not my tempo

Whiplash was sooo ridiculous and over the top! Hollywood thinks they have to hit their audience over the head with a 2 x 4 just to get their attention. Besides, no music teacher that maniacal could survive cause they would get their ass kicked on a regular basis!

i liked whiplash. my bad guys

What? I love that scene "Not my kind of tempo."

I think if someone makes a movie about jazz or anything for that matter, they should know what they’re talking about. Damien Chazelle could’ve at least consulted someone about jazz.

It’s a movie. It’s not supposed to be realistic. Also it ain’t about jazz. It’s about the sacrifices you have to make for success

Who said jazz is a joke??

In a nutshell the Jazz genre phenomena is not -music ed. Whiplash is all about a tormented perfection obsesed teather, sadistic educacional protcol and treating young people like shit.

well I don't know anything about whiplash other than its something rather unpleasant after a car wreck

He's right about everything technically but Whiplash is still a cool movie.

Fair game if he doesn't happen to like the movie, but I think it's silly for him to pretend that "Whiplash" is intended to be the definitive movie about The Jazz Experience. The milieu depicted in that picture doesn't reflect Donald's experience or the daily realities of most professional jazz musicians. The thing is, it doesn't need to, and it isn't trying to be that movie. It's about a very particular guy in a very particular Conservatory with a very particular teacher, and the psychological dynamics that develop. If Fagen thought it was supposed to accurately depict the struggles of your average young musician, that's his problem, not the movie's. He's flat out refusing to engage with it on its own terms. Which is fine, people do that all the time, but he's strangely cocky and bitter about it in this interview.

Whiplash reviews has separated 'narcissistic know it alls' from the more stable mind. There are those who need to be seen to know everything about music and so, heavily criticise that movie.

This comment section is full of people who understand a lot about jazz and absolutely nothing about storytelling!

I think Fagen's criticism is valid, but it's really ironic coming from him considering how Steely Dan's career arc culminating with GAUCHO is them stripping improvisation from jazz in favor of studio perfectionism.

Yeah whiplash really harped on that whole "people won't be great unless you treat them like garbage" BS. I also loathe how much drum related injuries become glamorized. Drum injuries SUCK, and are the sign of bad technique or straight up over-exertion. There's nothing cool about elbow tendinitis and nerve pain.

Could not agree more with DF’s comments, especially the,”f*ck him.” It shocks the mind to those of us who are roughly Donalds’ age, when we see egregious examples of lack of knowledge or distortions of facts play out in media concerning music, literature etc…. Much of it is simply laziness. Speaking, as they were, about low hanging fruit, I thought of those reaction channels, where a 5 yr old listens to a composition, and not only has no understanding of what they heard, but had no useable vocabulary to describe the experience. The lack of shame about that ignorance is put on display daily, and has become ubiquitous. DF’s right,”F*ck em.”

What sort of offends me about Donald's snobbery and the fact that he was offended by Fred Armisen is that all the jazz solos he got from big name jazz artists like Wayne Shorter, Pete Christlieb, etc, is that NONE of it sounds like real jazz, but rather their solos sound like slightly jazz flavored pop melodies. So somehow when Fred Armisen plays hard bop jazz that sounds like chaotic random notes he is offended people cant hear the melody in it. None of the music that Wayne Shorter played outside of the Steely Dan solos sound like that, all his other stuff just sounds like hard jazz which sounds like just melodic rambling at best. So I have respect that Donald and Walter got all these jazz greats to play music that sounds like normal music and not jazz. But Donald needs to understand that is the case and not be surprised when people are repulsed by the 'real jazz' that these guys played on all their other stuff.

Nobody was acting like white people invented jazz

two against nature

I love the movie. As most of the philistine audiences have. The ending moment...was one of the few occasions where God presented himself through the eyes of man. Glorious. As for DF...lest we forget any proper jazz fan laughs off SD as garbage schmaltz Muzak replete with mu chords any aged grandma would love. But don’t listen to me, research Chevy Chase’s quote, it’s hysterical.

Whiplash was un ugly movie about ugly people.

Jesus is the answer. He is the ONLY way to the Father in Heaven. Believe in and OBEY the Lord Jesus Christ, repent of your sins, get baptized, receive the Holy Spirit and be saved!

Although I agree with some of his opinions on this clip, I think it’s bad form to trash other people so brashly. I personally think his music is terribly boring and overproduced, but if I was in his position of being interviewed for a podcast, I wouldn’t be spewing my hot takes about how steely dan has only been influential to yacht rock and appeals mostly to intermediate-level musicians

Those guys are really missing the point of Whiplash huh...

I gave myself whiplash getting up to turn that shit movie off

Absolutely an L take

Fred Armisen is funny. Whiplash sucks.

Worst movie ever made. Nothing comes close.

Filthy language. What a shame.

Whiplash is one of the WORST movies ever made! Anyone with just a tiny understanding of music will agree.