Can't Buy a Thrill

Recorded in August 1972 at the Village Recorder, with engineer Roger Nichols and mastering by Doug Sax. The sessions were meant for the summer but were postponed until Nichols returned from vacation, which annoyed ABC Dunhill president Jay Lasker until A&R man Steve Barri argued the band was worth the time and expense. Several songs were older: Midnite Cruiser, Fire in the Hole and Brooklyn predate the move to Los Angeles, and a demo of Brooklyn has a second verse the album drops. Palmer arrived a week after he was offered the job, when most of the album was already recorded. Fagen sang most leads, while Palmer sang Dirty Work and Brooklyn and Hodder, who had never seen himself as a lead singer, offered to sing Midnite Cruiser. Guest Elliott Randall played lead guitar on Kings and Reelin' In the Years. Four songs were left off: Running Child, Sacajawea, Megashine City and Gullywater.

Kings is about the death of Richard I of England and the turmoil before his brother John took the throne, and Randall said his solo was inspired by the breakup of his first marriage. Fire in the Hole takes its title from a phrase used by American soldiers in Vietnam and alludes to students who evaded the draft. Brooklyn is about the tenant who lived below Fagen's apartment in Park Slope. Dirty Work is the only track with horns. The title echoes the opening lines of a Bob Dylan song, though Fagen said it came from Becker remarking that you can't buy a thrill in California.

The cover is a photomontage by Robert Lockart that includes prostitutes standing in Rue du Gros-Horloge in Rouen. The band disliked it but had no time left to try another idea. It was banned in Spain under Franco and replaced with a concert photograph. A tour began in October 1972 and ended in Atlanta on 27 May 1973, with sets that included songs written to show off Palmer, among them Take My Money and Hellbound Train, which were never released.

The album reached 17 on the Billboard chart, 4 in Canada and 38 in the UK, and went gold in May 1973 and platinum in September 1993. Robert Christgau called it a hit single with a good album attached. James Isaacs in Rolling Stone found three top-level cuts, and the BBC's Paul Lester said it was so fully formed that it was hard to believe it was a debut. AllMusic gave it 4.5 stars but faulted Palmer for oversinging, and Pitchfork gave it 8.6. Sasha Geffen wrote in Pitchfork that its two hits now play on classic rock stations beside Black Sabbath and Yes. Rolling Stone placed it 238th on its 2003 list.