Entertainment For Lively Minds
Tom Waits.Bad as me.Critique.
Posted by bricameron on 25 October 2011 - 6:31am.
Another I love but this is just gettin' to be a drag as Tom Waits parody's Tom Waits. "Tom.This is a piano.This.Is a quart of whiskey.These.Are heartbroken musicians bent on greatness.The human soul still suffers after the carnival.Now if you wouldn't mind...
- More from bricameron.
- Login or register to post comments
-
The 'I love Tom Waits' syndrome
He's one of those artists who you tell everyone you love. In reality I stopped loving and listening to Tom about a quarter of a century ago . Rain Dogs was his last great album but since then it's very hit and miss. Of course everyone knows that his raw dustbins and foghorn approach is much more groundbreaking but sadly the songs haven't been up to much.
Still I really do love Tom Waits.
Oh, I dunno.
Mule Variations is a wicked record. Lovely songs, brilliant everything. And while I've not heard this new one yet, it's being spoken of in the same breath as MV, which I find encouraging.
That said, I do think Rain Dogs was his last real peak. But that doesn't preclude his newer stuff still being pretty effin' good.
Mule Variations...
... could be his finest album. It's certainly in a different league entirely to the new one.
It was once described ...
..., and I forget by whom, as Tom Waits' greatest hits composed of all-new songs: I think it is a fine description of it (which I interpret as a compliment, and I certainly enjoy - rather than simply admire - the album endlessly: "Come down off the cross / We could use the wood" is a line I (probably mis) quote often, far too often to myself).
That was more-or-less...
... exactly how I described Bad As Me to a friend at the weekend: "A greatest hits of new songs". More so than Mule Variations, I think, anyway.
This is the best thing he's done since Rain Dogs,
unfortunately the films producers rejected it.
Tom Waits 'Theme From Iron Man 2'
by Adam Buxton
That is, in objective fact,
utterly wonderful.
I'm sorry about this, Massivers, but I feel a list coming on
I feel compelled to share with you my 20 favourite Tom Waits albums, in strict order of preference. The top 7 or so are all straight-up masterpieces.
1. Rain Dogs
2. Swordfishtrombones
3. Blue Valentines
4. The 'Bawlers' disc from Orphans
5. Small Change
6. Closing Time
7. Nighthawks at the Diner
8. Franks Wild Years
9. One From the Heart (soundtrack)
10. Alice
11. Heartattack and Vine
12. The Heart of Saturday Night
13. Real Gone
14. Mule Variations
15. The Rest of 'Orphans'
16. Foreign Affairs
17. Big Time
18. Night on Earth
19. Bone Machine
20. The Black Rider
Gigs:
1. Dominion Theatre, London, October 1985
2. Hammersmith Apollo, London, November 1987
Erm ... that's it. Those are the only two occasions that I've seen the great man.
Dominion
1985, is it that long ago? Still the greatist gig of my life. Went with a mate on the first night & was so blown away I took the future Mrs Pedr0 the following night with tout tickets. Never done that since. I agree that everything since Rain Dogs is easy to admire but difficult to love.
Like Scott Walker, Tom Waits
Like Scott Walker, Tom Waits is loved for his earlier stuff and mostly admired (or endured) for the later material.
The problem is, that I rarely stick a record on just to admire it, and while curiosity means that I'll buy Bad As Me, and I'll probably find two or three tracks I want to keep on my iPhone, chances are, it won't supplant Blue Valentines as my fave Waits LP.
And now, Muppets:
Su-poib
who does these things? I can just about imagine having the idea, but actually seeing it through is just amazing to me.
It says in his biog that he (it's always a 'he') is 41 yrs old.
Bad As Me pretty good
I've been listening to it for the past few days (it went on sale here last Friday) and I think it's really good. It's his strongest collection in years and it sounds great; certainly his best played album in ages. His young fellah does most of the drumming and go to guys Marc Ribot and David Hidalgo are great, but the real key here is a very loose Keith Richards. He's playing with a vibrancy and freedom that's been absent from Stones' recording for a generation or more, and it reminds me of the, uh, vibe on Rain Dogs: that late night, city feel.
Sure, Tom trots out the schtick a bit too much and we'll see the same quotes in all the press stuff but so what. Here's a take on explaining the voice:
http://laughingsquid.com/visible-tom-waits/
Late to the Party (Again)
I'm a comparatively recent convert to Tom Waits. One of the results of suddenly being exposed to multiple albums from an artist hitherto unheard of, is that you don’t get to go on the journey. How can you suddenly have 20 ish albums at your disposal created over 30 or so years and have any hope of knowing where to start?
I’ve been in this position for about two years I guess, long enough to know what I like but not long enough to appreciate hidden depth.
I can say that I really like the early piano ballads, his version of “Somewhere” from West Side Story is a thing of absolute beauty, and the new album is very approachable indeed on a first hearing.
Heard through from end to end last night. It’s a real variety piece. Feels like a theatrical event.
Love it.
Start at...
... the first, and listen to them in order. That's what I do when I 'discover' someone new/old.
Oily Night off the Black Rider
always struck me as what it would sound like if you tried to play techno using accoustic instruments.
This probably isn't the right thread, but that doesn't normally stop me.
Foreign Affairs
Enjoying this thread seems quite a few folk are in the ' I really want to enjoy this but it's head work' camp!
Thought Duco's list pretty good with main exception for me being the lowly position of Foreign Affair. If you want just one of his beatnik piano albums this is it and the title track is one of his loveliest ballads.
This is why I(WE) love Tom Waits
Tom enters The Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame
I've never been tempted
to consider the career of Tom Waits as one which is in decline. I don't think he's ever made a bad record, and many of the more recent ones which have passed through this thread unpraised, such as Alice and The Black Rider, I absolutely love.
I see SwordfishTrombones and Rain Dogs almost as the start of his greatness, or at least one phase of it. I genuinely love every album since then.
Lovely autumn day here....
...therefore a good 2 hours clearing gutters and sweeping up leaves. The only album on my mp3 player is this one and I must've listened to it all the way through 5 times.
It's fabulous! My only other conclusion is that Waits and Brennan are going their seperate ways!?