“I have never found anything as perfect as Steely Dan.”

Earlier this week, Steely Dan co-founder, guitarist and bassist Walter Becker passed away aged 67, prompting a wave of tributes from all corners of the music industry.

Read next: Inside Ed Motta’s 30,000-strong record collection

There are few however who lived the Steely Dan spirit quite like Brazilian MPB legend and record collector Ed Motta. “Steely Dan is my mania”, Motta told us in an interview last year, fanning six copies of Aja in his hands. “I love everything they produce. For me they are the top of the hill.”

Following the news of Becker’s passing, we asked Motta whether he would like to put together a tribute to his idol. Sure enough, just a few minutes later a 43-song playlist landed in our inbox, accompanied by a moving homage. From the impact on his own musical trajectory to a broader sympathy for the era Steely Dan represents, you can read Motta’s tribute and listen to the playlist below.

To explain the importance of Steely Dan in my life, I would need to write my autobiography and every chapter would mention their unique art. The first time I listened to them, they weren’t my cup of tea at all. In the early ’80s I was into hard rock, blues and soul/funk, basically music that felt more raw, more spontaneous. I felt Steely Dan was too clean, too aseptic.

In the early ’90s I got really into jazz and started to learn piano. I will never forget the day I heard ‘Babylon Sisters’ for the first time, with the right attitude. It changed my life forever.

When I started listening to it properly, my biggest love and main interests in their music were the composition, clever chord changes, sublime studio sound, and intelligent solos. It was years later before I started to pay attention to the great and unusual lyrics that have strong references to things I also love, like film noir, science fiction, etc.

Music is my sanctuary, the meaning of my life, and I have never found anything as perfect as Steely Dan. I have many records in my collection but nothing comes close to their perfection.

I listen to their music, including solo albums, every week, and each time I find something new. It’s really the soundtrack to my life.

Nowadays music is sort of the opposite of what Steely Dan was proposing. To play an instrument and to write a decent song with well constructed melodies, and chord changes, seems like something from the distant past. The thing that I most feel deeply sad about when someone from Walter Becker’s generation dies is that art, in the way I understand and love it, is also dying.

Music is something beautiful and I love music. I love Steely Dan.

Tracklist:

2) I Got The News

3) Green Earrings

4) Razor Boy

5) Rose Darling

6) Pretzel Logic

7) Fire In The Hole

8) Pixeleen

9) Deacon Blues

10) Glamour Profession

11) Almost Gothic

12) Throw Back The Little Ones

13) Night By Night

14) Kings

15) Third World Man

16) Kid Charlemagne

17) Peg

18) King Of The World

19) Home At Last

20) With A Gun

21) Doctor Wu

22) The Fez

23) Hey Nineteen

24) Aja

25) Only A Fool Would Say That

26) Haitian Divorce

27) Any Major Dude Will Tell You

28) The Boston Rag

29) Here At The Western World

30) Bad Sneakers

31) West Of Hollywood

32) The Caves Of Altamira

33) My Rival

34) Black Cow

35) Turn That Heartbeat Over Again

36) Any World (That I’m Welcome To)

37) Sign In Stranger

38) Your Gold Teeth

39) Josie

40) Don’t Take Me Alive

41) Parker’s Band

42) Your Gold Teeth II

43) Gaucho