Tom Waits

wild_eyed

anyone got anything to say about this genius.

personal favorite albums

Swordfishtrombone
Rain Dogs
Alice
The Black Rider
Blue Valentine

Liver-Lips

Man Blue valentines is such a great album. My personal favorite.
Christmas card from a hooker in miniapolis? so damn fine.

im a big fan of Heart of Saturday Night. A good album that makes it for me just because the song: Please call me Baby.
JJ smiths on anger street has a good band on a fri nights like a cross between Tom Waits, Van Morrison and Ron Sexmith or something. anyway a good night.

Sarsfield

Heart of Saturday Night is class.

JJs is a great venue. The band on Friday is called the Raindogs. They are a pretty talented bunch of folks alright! Peter Moore has one of the best voices around for Waits style music.

Liver-Lips

Ah yes, the raindogs.

Anyone buy the two most recent albums that he released? Alice and Blood Money. I bought Alice and think its class. dont know about Blood Money though, heard it was from his really crazy side which i havent gotten into yet.

Chad ghostal

still slowly getting into the later tom waits, love the early stuff but mule variations and alice took me much longer to get into,
really like alice, well worth the effort..

Baggio

Yep,,,I like him...*What!!??...a Hard Rock Rush fan likes waites????!!!...*,,,ahh well..it's nice to have variety, yes I just ordered Blue Valentine tonight from Amazon.com . I used to have half a dozen albums of his on Vinyl and have decided to buy some cd's etc.

Faves: Blue Valentine, Heart Attack and Vine,
Small Change , Closing Time.

He's a fine artist and totally unique.....ciao' ...Baggio......

wild_eyed

blood mone is top class, but alice is better, i love the baroom jazz feel to it.

Fusion251

Ben Monder - Flux......it be some crazie sheeit!

Robbo

Small Change and Closing Time would be two of my favourites.

Pasties and a G-String is nice'n'sleazy.

calis

people people people is there any disputing that his best albums are raindogs blood money and mule variations in that order!!!

while his "softer stuff" is definatily eons better than most other artists i think there can be no argument that the sound on those albulms are the definitve tom waits sound. tho have to say i cant stop listening to real gone and since discovering waits myself few years back am still finding it hard to listen to other artists.

ferdi

tom waits is the man, cool as ****.

I have his autograph

calis

seen him in hammersmith. i will never be the same again. ever.

pancakeman

calis wrote:

seen him in hammersmith. i will never be the same again. ever.

that bad eh?

calis

lol. as he says in the song shake it ... he was like a preacher waving a gun around.

hope i dont have to wait another 2000 years or so til he gigs again.

damntheman

i love tom waits

princess penny

how do people feel about Real Gone?
I love it anyway!

princess penny

how do people feel about Real Gone
I love it anyway!

fade2black

martha in the confines of closing time.

princess penny

sorry for posting that twice

calis

real gone is fantastic. his voice never been better.some great lyrics and the band is cool. tho i find its best listened to wit headphones on as on my crappy stereo it sounded crap.

daram

We should start a petition or something to get him to play i n Ireland again. He's always here after all, his wife is from Cork.

My old man did sound for him when he played in the olympia and in galway back in the eighties. Still has some of the dats. They are so sweet but Im not allowed copy them. No one is.

nlgbbbblth

I'd rank Tom Waits albums as follows

01 Swordfishtrombones
02 Rain Dogs
03 Bone Machine
04 Small Change
05 Blood Money
06 Mule Variations
07 Closing Time
08 Frank's Wild Years
09 Alice
10 Real Gone
11 Blue Valentine
12 The Black Rider
13 Heartattack And Vine
14 The Heart Of Saturday Night
15 Nighthawks At The Diner
16 Foreign Affairs

John

daram wrote:

We should start a petition or something to get him to play i n Ireland again. He's always here after all, his wife is from Cork.

My old man did sound for him when he played in the olympia and in galway back in the eighties. Still has some of the dats. They are so sweet but Im not allowed copy them. No one is.

If I thought a petition would work I'd be all for it. He played Berlin a couple of days after I left which was a pisser (not that I could afford the tout prices). The man's a legend, I so don't own enough of his albums.

And Dara, please don't tease about having those dats. You shouldn't mention them if you can't copy them. Now I'm going to have to break into your house...

Fanny Cradock

i know he played in london recently and he was interviewed by dave fanning on the radio a couple of months back -kept saying "geeee, i dont know dave"

so u never know.........he may come back yet!!


when i first started listening 2 him about 4 years ago i began, like many, with his earlier gateway stuff. could never get my head around his later, more "crazy" albums. those albums, swordfishtrombones, raindogs etc. are not initially easy to fall into, and for that reason i was dismissive of them and their brilliance. now however, ive done an "about turn" and i hear more substance in his later albums than his earlier (lighter??) ones (closing time, heart of saturday night etc.)

imo, raindogs has gotta b his best.

alice is fantastic as well "arithmetic arithmetock, i turn the hands back on the clock" love that line
mule variations
Small Change
blue valentine "theres a dark huddle at the bus stop, umberellas aranged in a sad bouquet"
and kentucky ave makes me wanna cry everytime i hear it, but being a hard ass i dont



havent had the pleasure to to listen to real gone yet, but im intrigued by his description of the album as being "cubist funk".


oh yes!

Wolff

I saw him back in 87 or 88 in the Olympia

Great Show - pity to have to wait for so long for him to come back

daram

Oh John, guess what I have now. A bootleg of that very same Berlin gig. Four cds worth. All on this little laptop, ready to be shared. And they're ****in great.

Still cant convince the leisureland dats out of my old man.

John

Four cd's!?! That man is a legend.

deedee lepoopoo

Big Tom! He is the man.That interview with Dave Fanning was hilarious. After a real long winded question by Dave, Tom would just say 'Gee Dave I dunno', and sometimes he would laugh. hahaha. I taped the whole thing. Tom's music speaks for itself.

lee_baby_simms

anyone see him on letterman doin that new song 'make it rain'? ah it was a while ago.



i dont feel that the new record is near his best but as usual he's still raising eyebrows all over the place.

he's also the only musician i can think of just doesnt seem to ever release dodgy music. i always feel confident before i hear any new stuff.

franks wild years is the album i play the most.

irokie

blood money is great.
weird as sin, but GREAT!

the new one, Real Gone, has no piano on it. it's also really good.

breadmonkey

The first Tom Waits album I ever heard was "Closing Time". I got a shock when I heard some of his other stuff!

wild_eyed

a 'friend' is selling his "tales from the underground" collection. pm if there is any interest. he has all five.

fatherdougalmag

Couldn't believe it. Was feeling a bit nostaligic tonight and dl'ed Small Change (I do own it, it's in work). Great stuff. A friend introduced me to him when I was in college. Was he on Gay Byrne at one stage? Then I discovered that another fave of mine (Neil Finn) also listens to him. Must be a Tchad Blake thing. One negative thing I'd have to say would be about the film Shortcuts. What a bunch of crap. That aside, TW is just terrific no matter what my wife says.

iga

Dear oh dear is he good1
Went to see his production of Woyzcek in the Gaeity! My my what wonderful stuff he had in preparation. He was in the audience of all things directing the music although it wasnt publicised! The lyrics on Blood money and Alice were absolutely top class even by his standards, probably as a result of the format he was producing for (stage). Heard a recording of a Biography that was broadcast in Chicago a couple of years ago and heard some songs I didnt know existed, anyone heard of Mockingbird song he did? Very bob Dylan. If ya want to see him in film check out pretty much any of Jim Jarmusch films. He rocks and they seem to collaberate a lot.

iga

iga wrote:

Dear oh dear is he good1
Went to see his production of Woyzcek in the Gaeity! My my what wonderful stuff he had in preparation. He was in the audience of all things directing the music although it wasnt publicised! The lyrics on Blood money and Alice were absolutely top class even by his standards, probably as a result of the format he was producing for (stage). Heard a recording of a Biography that was broadcast in Chicago a couple of years ago and heard some songs I didnt know existed, anyone heard of Mockingbird song he did? Very bob Dylan. If ya want to see him in film check out pretty much any of Jim Jarmusch films. He rocks and they seem to collaberate a lot.

Tindersticks do a beautiful version on "step right up"

And did anyone recognise him in Bram stokers dracula? He was superb.

damntheman

And I was always so impulsive, I guess that I still am,
And all that really mattered then was that I was a man.
I guess that our being together was never meant to be.
And Martha, Martha, I love you can't you see?

And those were the days of roses, poetry and prose
And Martha all I had was you and all you had was me.
There was no tomorrows, we'd packed away our sorrows
And we saved them for a rainy day.

Backtoblack

Closing Time [Might be my favourite album by T Waits I think, "Hope I dont' fall in love with you" & lots of other great tunes!]

The Heart Of Saturday Night [One of the first albums I bought]

Nighthawks at the Diner [Bought this recently, recommended!]

Franks Wild Years ["Staight to the Top", "Innocent when you dream", "Cold cold ground" such great tunes.]

Small Change [Very rude album cover ]

That's all I have so far..

renmorescout

I was at the Galway concert in the 80's. If I remember right, it was a wet Miserable friday night, in salthill, and we were going to see this guy we had only realy heard of, The show was nearly two hours late starting, but Tom played late into the morning to make up for it. It was well worth the wait.
The piano might have been drinking, but Tom was just magic!
All my kids are into music big time, and it really Pee's them off that I have seen him live.

nlgbbbblth

renmorescout wrote:

I was at the Galway concert in the 80's. If I remember right, it was a wet Miserable friday night, in salthill, and we were going to see this guy we had only realy heard of, The show was nearly two hours late starting, but Tom played late into the morning to make up for it. It was well worth the wait.
The piano might have been drinking, but Tom was just magic!
All my kids are into music big time, and it really Pee's them off that I have seen him live.

Leisureland 1981?
Heard it was great alright.

A track from that tour ended up on the compilation LP Bounced Checks.

renmorescout

Leisureland 1981?
That must have been the one. It seems a long time ago. It was the first time
I had really heard of Tom Waits, but started a lone affection for his music. Now, my teenage sons love him as well. Rock and Roll need more characters like Tom Waits !

carpainter

I don't have many of tom's recordings, but my own personal favourites are:

Mule Variations
Black Rider
Small Change
Heart of Saturday Night
Real Gone

There's some early (70s) footage of him on Youtube which is really great! My wife doesn't really like the more recent material but she'll tolerate Mule Variations, although she gets really annoyed when I whistle the (whistled) part from "What's he building in there" What a great song.

CrazyPJ

Got Orpahns (Bawlers, Bralers,Bastards) a few weeks ago and I just love it, nearly every track is a gem with some of the most beautiful love songs I have ever heard, some hard rocking genius and weirdess unparalled. I think its his best yet but I say that bout nearly every album he brings out.

Turd Ferguson

How can there be a Tom Waits thread without mentioning Captain Beefheart, the guy that almost single handedly inspired him to get into music...

jimjam91

I'm trying to find out hat the story of the song Small Change is, does anyone know?
I'm guessing it was a friend or someone famous but i would like to know for sure, that is, if there is a story behind it.

joewicklow

jimjam91 wrote: »

I'm trying to find out hat the story of the song Small Change is, does anyone know?
I'm guessing it was a friend or someone famous but i would like to know for sure, that is, if there is a story behind it.

I think you are going to like this,

http://www.tomwaitslibrary.com/lyrics/smallchange/smallchange.html

Its a fantastic site.

J.

tarbolton

The great trilogy of the mid-80s

Swordfishtrombones
Rain Dogs
Franks Wild Years

Never bettered!

damselnat

God I LOVE this man:D:D Have done since I was about 15/16 and was getting out of being a little rocker, the whole beat thing really appealed to me back then, now the music remains...when he played a few years ago I was dying to go and my mother booked a holiday to fly out the very day he played! Was very unimpressed to say the least.....Anyone hear him talking about when he lived here for a while, and near closing time in the local he got up and started tinkering on the piano, only to hear one guy behind mutter to his friend about "that fella's crap Tom Waits impression" ?

I love the older stuff particularly, Closing Time, Blue Valentine, Heartattack, Raindogs probably my favourites, it's all genius though:D Although try telling that to my flatmate who refuses to even give him a chance (bar Jersey Girl which he admits is a good song) based on impressions and things he's heard on the Simpsons's His loss though!

Anyone else think that Beauty and the Beast song (from the movie) sounds awfully like the Briar and the Rose in parts? Or maybe I'm just imagining things....

TheBandit

Is Tom Waits mentioned in the simpsons?

damselnat

TheBandit wrote: »

Is Tom Waits mentioned in the simpsons?

Apparently there's some reference made to his gravely voice? I'm no expert on the Simpson's (unlike the men in my life:rolleyes:) so I can't give a precise point...

Actually it could be Futurama or Family Guy or any of them really. South Park? Some sort of cartoon anyway!

Gussie Finknott

Tom actually spent his honeymoon in Tralee Co Kerry