Today’s classic feel good get-up-and-dance song of the day is “You Make Me Feel Like Dancing,” by Leo Sayer—which has an interesting connection to Steely Dan’s classic album, Aja.
Mr. Sayer released “You Make Me Feel Like Dancing” in October of 1976. It was an instant radio hit, reaching #1 on the Billboard Hot 100, #1 in Canada, and #2 in the singer’s home country of Britain. The song was written by Mr. Sayer and partner Vincent “Vini” Poncia, who was also responsible for co-writing (with others) songs like “Do I Love You? (#34 in 1964 for the Ronettes), “(The Best Part of) Breakin’ Up” (#39 in 1964 for the Ronettes), “New York is a Lonely Town” (#32 in 1965 for the Trade Winds), “Oh My My” (#5 in 1974 for Ringo Starr), and “I Was Made for Lovin’ You” (#11 in 1979 for Kiss).
“You Make Me Feel Like Dancing” was Leo Sayer’s second top ten hit in the U.S., after 1974’s “Long Tall Glasses,” which hit #9 on the Billboard Hot 100. Subsequent hits for Mr. Sayer included “When I Need You” (#1 in 1977), “How Much Love” (#17 in 1977), and “More Than I Can Say” (#2 in 1980). There wasn’t much more after that.
The Steely Dan connection concerns the drummer on “You Make Me Feel Like Dancing,” the inimitable Steve Gadd. (The other heavyweight musicians on the track included Larry Carlton and Ray Parker Jr. on guitar and Chuck Rainey on bass, which helps to explain its infectious groove.) Apparently Mr. Gadd, a New York-based studio cat, was flown into Los Angeles for two days to play on a track for Steely Dan. Engineer Bill Schnee was working on both the Leo Sayer tracks for producer Richard Perry and tracks for Steely Dan’s upcoming album, Aja, with producer Gary Katz. Schnee happened to mention to Perry that he was recording with Gadd, then Perry asked “Do you think I could do a session with him?”
Schnee said he was free to ask but he’d have to record Gadd at his Producer’s Workshop studio, where he had Gadd’s drums all set up and tuned in. Gary Katz gave the okay to use Gadd and the room, and they gave Steve a call. He came in early the next day for a 10:00 session with Schnee, Perry, and Sayer and laid down the rhythm tracks for “You Make Me Feel Like Dancing.” That session ended at 1:00 pm, then he hung around for a 2:00 pm session with Schnee, Katz, Donald Fagen, and Walter Becker. That session was for the song “Aja,” which Gadd aced (complete with that awesome drum solo) in a single take. All that awesomeness in a single take. It’s all documented in Bill Schnee’s book, Chairman at the Board.
By the way, Mr. Gadd was so busy back then that he didn’t always remember every track on which he played. (That wasn’t uncommon with studio musicians, especially when the cats were just laying down rhythm tracks and never heard the vocals.) Months later, Becker and Fagen were in A&R studios in New York, doing the mix for “Aja” with Gary Katz and engineer Elliot Scheiner. Someone mentioned that Steve Gadd was down the hall in another studio, laying down some tracks for vocalist Michael Franks. Katz went down and asked Gadd to drop by when he was done recording, which he did. Katz sat him down and punched the “play” button for “Aja,” which they’d just finished mixing. Katz relates the rest:
“He (Gadd) sat right between the Altec 604 Utility cabinets. It was great sounding. The track ends and he said, ‘Wow, who is playing drums?’ Donald, Walter and I, Roger Nichols and Elliot, are just looking at each other. Because he wasn’t kidding. I say, ‘You are, stupid!’ He went, ‘Really? I’m a motherfucker!’ It’s the best laugh we had in all of the years.”
None of that has anything to do with Leo Sayer, of course. Despite not having any more chart hits after 1980 or so, he continued releasing albums and the occasional single, mainly in Australia, the U.K., and Singapore. (Born a Brit, he became an Australian citizen in 2009.) His latest album, Selfie, was released in 2019. He’s still around and singing (and maybe dancing, if he feels like it) today, age 74.
