“Rikki Don't Lose That Number”—first song, side one of Pretzel Logic (1974)

Though this song could be about drugs, gambling, or something even more metaphorically buried, on the surface it's about a phone number—specifically the narrator of the song giving his phone number to a woman named Rikki, as kind of an invitation to a relationship which might be about friendship, romance, or possibly backup singing. There is a long tradition of pop songs about phone numbers and telephone calls (some of them titled as a number itself!) and I'm not generally crazy about the idea. I even wrote one myself—and sadly, it's one of my better songs—even though in a time not long from now, the general audience will have no idea what it's about. (It's about an “answering machine.”) In fact, Telephone is one of the “Three T's of Pop Music”—the others being, Trains, and Tomorrow (Mañana)—based lyric-wise, at least, in the realm of the blues. They all tend to be love songs, of course, but have their specifics colored in by laments about leaving (saying goodbye), waiting (for things to get better), and yearning (for the phone to ring—which both requires an independent being, quite out of your control, to make a decision, at some point, to reach out to you via this technology that most of us still find kind of alienating, and requires a Herculean effort to both have your number and to get it correct while dialing).

This very well could have been the first Steely Dan song I was aware of, as it was, I believe, their biggest hit single, and I very definitely remember it when I was 14, eating breakfast before school, playing on the AM radio my parents' always had on in the kitchen in the morning. To this day, I am nostalgic for AM radio in the kitchen, but also horrified by being forced to hear the same songs over and over while I'm preparing for something I'd rather not do. I think, at the time, I thought it was ultimate “Squaresville”—and also, it occurs to me now that a single word choice, the first word in the song, “We hear you're leaving” (instead of “I hear you're leaving”), roots the song in a kind of queasy frat-boy/bro world that has always turned me off. Listening to the song now, however, just makes me happy. Is it because the memory of the horror of breakfast cereal, local radio, and catching the school bus has now turned to nostalgia? Or is it because this radio pop song sounds really unlike any other radio pop song of the time, or since? I suppose at that time, in spite of not wanting to grow up (I still haven't), I also was getting really interested in adult things—and this song was as adult as anything in my life—even if I didn't like it. Maybe there was part of me that knew I'd love it some day.

—Randy Russell 4.19.20