[originally appeared in Shindig! issue #129)

When Linda Hoover entered New York’s Advantage Sound Studios in 1970, she was an excited 19-year-old who had never been in a studio before. Little did she know the album she made, I Mean To Shine, would never be released. But the album became legendary as the first album to feature songs by Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, who were soon to become the linchpins of Steely Dan – songs that never appeared anywhere else. Not only that, but Becker and Fagen also played on the album, along with guitarists Jeff ‘Skunk’ Baxter and Denny Dias who also became part of the Dan. Now, after 52 years, I Mean To Shine is finally seeing the light of day.

The catalyst for the album was producer Gary Katz, who Hoover met when she was 14 and auditioned for him at Bobby Darin’s music publishing company in the fabled Brill Building. “I liked Gary from the moment my parents and I were introduced to him,“  Hoover tells Shindig!. “He was a young, cool guy who knew his stuff when it came to music, and throughout my high school years, Gary tried to convince my father to allow him to try to get me a record deal.” When Hoover finally signed with Roulette Records, Katz recruited Fagen and Becker, then trying to make a living in New York City as songwriters, as writers and producers for her album.

When asked about her most vivid memories of making I Mean To Shine, Hoover says, “My first and most vivid memory is of Donald Fagen playing the piano and teaching me ‘I Mean To Shine’. It was hard to concentrate because I could not take my eyes off his beautiful hands playing that piano. The chords he played were beautiful. I was star-struck and he wasn’t even a star yet, but to me, he was. I loved the way he sang and I told him so. And Walter was a wizard on the bass. He had a quick, dry wit, and never missed a thing.”

She was also amazed by the skill of the studio musicians who played on the tracks. “Eric Weissberg was one cool dude. He came to the session on his motorcycle, dressed in his leathers. I taught him the guitar part on my song ‘Autumn’ and he played it right back to me, with flourish. Denny Dias had perfect touch and timing on the acoustic guitar, and when Jeff ‘Skunk’ Baxter came in to play some electric and pedal steel guitar parts, his positivity and upbeat personality were a breath of fresh air.”

The tracks for I Mean To Shine were recorded late at night, when studio rates were cheaper. Hoover was staying with friends in New Jersey, so when a session ended, she had to walk by herself through seedy parts of New York City at three or four AM to catch a bus home. “My parents would have died, had they known that.” The completed album consisted of seven tracks composed by Fagen and Becker, three of Hoover’s own compositions, and two covers (The Band’s ‘In A Station’ and CSNY’s ‘4 + 20’). The album tracks were mastered and the album art was readied, featuring a cover portrait of Hoover by renowned music photographer Joel Brodsky.

And then things unexpectedly went bad. A dispute arose over publishing rights, and the album release was abruptly cancelled.  A friend who worked at Advantage made Hoover backup reel-to-reel tapes of the master recording, and that was all that she took away from those months of hard work. ‘I Mean To Shine’ was recorded by Barbra Streisand on her album Barbra Joan Streisand, but that was all the world got to hear of Becker and Fagen’s work from that era. Listening to Hoover’s album now, it’s hard not to imagine what it could have accomplished if it had been released at the time. Even beyond the lyrics and instrumentation that are clear precursors to Steely Dan’s early work, I Mean To Shine is remarkably confident and unified, with a wonderful synergy between Hoover’s vibrato vocals and the subtle energy of the backing musicians.

Katz persuaded the musicians who worked on the album, including Hoover, to form a group called Cody Canyon. The group recorded a few tracks in Boston, but didn’t attract enough interest to keep going. Katz then accepted a job in Los Angeles as a staff producer at Dunhill Records, and Becker, Fagen, Dias, and Baxter went with him to start what became Steely Dan. Hoover says Baxter tried to persuade her to join them in LA, but she decided to return to her parents in Florida. She played live gigs there, including ‘Jones’ and ‘Turn My Friend Away’ from I Mean to Shine in her sets, but it was difficult to get gigs because she was too young to play in licensed venues. However, at one of her Florida shows she was introduced to Jay Willingham, who eventually became her husband.

The tapes of I Mean To Shine were kept in a closet at Hoover’s house; the family didn’t own a reel-to-reel tape recorder, so they couldn’t even listen to the album for a long time, until Willingham finally got the tapes transferred onto a cassette. After Morris Levy, Roulette’s owner, passed away, the Roulette catalogue eventually ended up with Warner Music Group. Willingham, who is an attorney, contacted the Warner legal team, who connected them with Omnivore Records. However, Hoover recalls, “the folks there told me that they would need to talk to Gary before they could go forward with the release. I was afraid to call him because it had been 52 years since we had spoken, and here I was going to call him and ask him for something. I wrestled with that for a few days and finally Toft [her younger son] said, ‘Mom, you won’t ever hit the ball if you don’t take a swing.’ For some reason, those words gave me the courage to call Gary, and I am so thankful that I did. I love the guy and I realize how much I have missed him.”

As it turned out, Hoover’s tapes of I Mean To Shine were the only existing copy of the album; the master recordings were lost somewhere along the way. The tapes were baked and transferred to CD, and Toft was part of the team involved in remastering the album. He also produced Hoover’s 2018 independent release, Another World, and has transferred all of her recordings onto a hard drive, with hopes of re-releasing more of her music in the future. Hoover currently works in her husband’s law office, and has “no idea what is next, other than to keep doing what I do. They call me a singer/songwriter. That sort of sums me up. I just love music and always will.”

Even with the unexpected detours that beset I Mean To Shine, Hoover says, “it was a tremendous experience to go into a state-of the-art professional recording studio situation with Gary and such seasoned and talented musicians and engineers. I learned so much, and 52 years later, I am still learning. Recording is amazing fun, especially now, because the endless possibilities of what can be done with a song. For me it was fun back in 1970, and is even more so now. I consider the release of this album to be a blessing.”

I Mean To Shine is on Omnivore Records