He's touring the US soon

Boys night at a mates place, he put on 'Alice' while we were drinking whiskey and watching the trains go through Newmarket station. Bought Heartattack and Vine the next day. These days I'm trying to learn to play him on keys, too.

Wish he'd tour here.

Tom Waits...I was fascinated by how bizarre "Goin' Out West" was, seeing it on rage late at night - came across as outsider art with a sense of humour, but was also structured very well and was obviously written by someone who knew what they were doing (as opposed to Wesley Willis). And then the Smashing Pumpkins, who I was a big fan of, covered "Ol' 55" and I downloaded that as well. Artists that are capable of very different extremes fascinate me, so I eventually got "Rain Dogs" and "Swordfishtrombones", and slowly worked my way backwards and forwards through his catalogue.

My Mum used to have a copy of Heartattack and Vine which I liked listening to as a kid. I rented the black rider on cd one day and I've been buying his records ever since.

I didn't know he had any more shows planned...hmmm....man, giving some serious thought to travelling just to see one of his gigs.

My first exposure was buying Blue Valentine on a whim, downloading more tracks, buying Alice, and going from there really. Got just about every CD, plus assorted bootleg dvds.

He's a true genius.

Wish he'd tour here

seconded, thirded and more. My number one wishlist tour, sigh.

I had an ex who loved Tom, I think 'Heartattack and Vine' was the first album I purchased and it all went from there.

Bump. More love for poor old Tom Waits.

My girlfriend tells me there was an interview which went something like this:

I: "Have you ever considered, you know, getting insurance for your voice?"
Tom: "Against what? Vandals?"

rain dogs is the radness and the last one is tops, a move away from piano

I really want to get to America for this, but there's no way.

there'll be a tom waits box set released in a couple of months by his label anti (epitaph/shock)...

which is something to get excited about.

i don't think tom will ever tour australia again. which is sad. i had the chance to see him once, when i was poor in LA and tickets were expensive. i didn't go. i've regretted it deeply ever since.

me = nimrod.

so the box set may contain live moments and then we can all live vicariously...

twose listening to alice last night drunk, still sounds great

haha, watching an infamous interview with him by Lee Simons on a late 70s rock show called Night Moves (?).

I must have been getting older and wasn't shunted off to bed by my mum.
The interview has Simons following Waits around in a bar. It was pretty mind-blowing at the time.

I was pretty hooked tho I've never been a passionate collector.
Friends used to own lots of records.
I only own Heart Attack and Vine.

Hmmmm......I kinda lost interest in Tom Waits after 'Black Rider', but I'm working up to listening to some of his more recent stuff. Any recommendations?

i only really know the newer stuff, bout to start working on the older..with our powers combined we'd know it all...

Just steer clear of " A Foreign Affair", anon. No fucking good! But any other old Tom Waits is pure gold!

noted.

i'd say try your luck with mule variations, but others may see things differently.

There was this live Waits track I heard ages ago, a cover I think, about a guy getting picked up by a truck driver and later realising it was a ghost - great song.

sbs is showing a Jim Jarmusch retrospective soon, so we'll see him in Down By Law.

Ourkid, that'd be " Big Joe And Phantom 309", best appreciated on the "Nighthawks At The Diner" album. The song was written by someone called Tommy Faile.

Thanks hand hell. I thought it had something to do with 309, but I thought i'd mixed it up with Johnny Cash's 'Like the 309'. Will go see if emusic has it.

Hey Tom Wait's has just done a new radio interview with NPR's Terry Gross

...goes for 45mins

it's a bewdy!

It's OK guys...you can all stop worrying.

PHEW!

Puts down the razord blades

Lozenge said 11 minutes ago:
Hey Tom Wait's has just done a new radio interview with NPR's Terry Gross
...goes for 45mins
it's a bewdy!

...and heres me under the impression the JJJ interview was the only one he was doing.

Hey Tom Wait's has just done a new radio interview with NPR's Terry Gross

Poor Zan

Well, I'm sure at the time when Zan did her interview she was told ''this is the only radio interview he's doing worldwide for the album''... but it appears he's changed his mind! Is no biggie....

I don't imagine he'll be doing many more anyways.... (I've looked n' can't find any others done or upcoming).

Both Zan's and the NPR interview are brilliant for different reasons - enjoy them both!

Now I've heard this on vinyl. All the haters can go fuck em' selves this is brilliant.

So I know music is pretty much free these days, but for those of you who still like having discs to put on your shelves, this is quite the bargain opportunity to explore early Tom: Closing Time, The Heart Of Saturday Night, Nighthawks At The Diner, Small Change, Foreign Affairs - $20 the lot!

I have the Zevon boxset from them - great stuff. Wish I'd known there was a Tom Waits version when I was in JB the other day...

Yeah, I saw that. I'd buy it if I didn't have the albums already. Good Xmas stocking stuffer though.

they left off blue valentine though!

I got this 5 pack. The first two albums blow chunks. Nighthawks At The Diner is the shit.

Wow there are a lot of these 5-album sets. Pretty much something for everyone.

Wow there are a lot of these 5-album sets. Pretty much something for everyone.

DAFSFFS

Closing Time is bizarre to listen to knowing what comes after, and you can sort of hear the Tom Waits we know and love start to emerge on The Heart Of Saturday Night. Nighthawks At The Diner, to me, has great banter and songs that are so-so, but it's Small Change where Waits really fucking nails it/becomes his own man/etc. Foreign Affairs, Blue Valentine and Heartattack and Vine are of the same quality as Small Change, more or less. Though I kinda reckon his best pre-sounding-like-Beefheart record might well be One From The Heart.

I really like Closing Time. The Heart Of Saturday Night and Nighthawks At The Diner not so much. I find his banter kind of irritating.

Wow there are a lot of these 5-album sets. Pretty much something for everyone.
DAFSFFS

You DAFSFFSed back to this thread! But, point taken.

I just finished reading Barney Hoskyns' Tom Waits bio. A fascinating read, even considering the writer's own ambivalence about the worth of attempting to nail down a slippery subject such as Waits, especially when he hates the idea of anyone undertaking such a task.

Anyway, it's made me listen back to some of the albums that I haven't really gotten into that much, such as Mule Variations and Real Gone. I've also had Bad As Me on repeat. For ages I was frustrated with what I thought was Waits getting lazy and repetitive with his style and instrumentation, but if you take all the good songs from these later albums and compile them into one playlist, it adds up to a kickarse collection.

Real Gone is the best thing he's ever done. No __ intended.

In 1985 Waits revealed the true story behind ''Christmas Card From A Hooker In Minneapolis''-
“I was in Minneapolis - it was 200 degrees below zero – I know – you think I’m bullshitting, no, I swear to God, I was wearing just a bra and a slip and a kind of dead squirrel around my neck – he was colder than I was. The police cars would go by and they’d wave… Merry Xmas, Merry Xmas, Merry Xmas – anyway – I got caught in the middle of a pimp war between 2 kids in Chinchilla coats, they couldn’t have been more than 13 years old- they’re throwing knives and forks and spoons out into the street – it was deep – so I grabbed a ladle – and Dinah Washington was singing “Our Day Will Come” and I knew that was it.”

FrankieTeardrop said 15 hours ago:
I just finished reading Barney Hoskyns' Tom Waits bio. A fascinating read, even considering the writer's own ambivalence about the worth of attempting to nail down a slippery subject such as Waits, especially when he hates the idea of anyone undertaking such a task.

Yep, great read that. It too put me on total rediscovery of Waits' discography.