Tom Waits Swordfishtrombones

Throughout the 1970's, Tom Waits desperately sought to craft himself as a traditional balladeer, a singer-songwriter for the masses. This process was always undermined, though, by the fact that every time he tried to sing an emphatic note, he sounded like a blue tick hound with its scrotum caught in a revolving door. It was with this 1980 release that he came to realize this wasn't a handicap, it was an instrument he could play as effectively as he played his guitar and piano…….

A major part of Tom Waits's mystique has always been his complex, intriguing persona; part Bukowski-esque barfly poet, part Kerouac-inspired hipster, part Hoagy Carmichael troubadour. Nowhere has that persona been more fully utilized than on "Nighthawks At The Diner". Throughout the album waits unfurls his colorful, charismatic, artfully amplified personality. It's like spending the evening with a lounge lizard/raconteur/beatnik standup comic who also happens to compose strikingly beautiful tunes that could have come from the Great American Songbook if not for their lyrical quirkiness. Though it would be a few more years before Waits would reinvent himself on "Swordfishtrombones", the character who stomps through your brain on "Nighthawks At The Diner" with both guns blazing is as original and impressive a character as you could want.

The 1973 album that introduced a young singer-songwriter to the world at large is a far cry from the wonderfully twisted sonic landscape that would define "Swordfishtrombones" a decade later. The Waits of "Closing Time" was a barroom balladeer too, but one who fit neatly into the early-'70s folk-rock, singer-songwriter paradigm ("Closing Time's opener "Ol' '55," in fact, was covered by the Eagles on their first album). The arrangements here are straightforward, piano-based affairs that present the songs with a minimum of fuss.

After perfecting his seedy beatnik image on albums like "Small Charge" and "Nighthawks At The Diner", Waits refined and expanded on it until the 1983 breakthrough of "Swordfishtrombones". "Blue Valentine" is full of low-rent nightlife imagery and arrangements that leave Waits' jazz leanings behind in favor of a more direct, blues-oriented approach.

After perfecting his seedy beatnik image on albums like "Small Charge" and "Nighthawks At The Diner", Waits refined and expanded on it until the 1983 breakthrough of "Swordfishtrombones". "Blue Valentine" is full of low-rent nightlife imagery and arrangements that leave Waits' jazz leanings behind in favor of a more direct, blues-oriented approach. Lyrically, he's at his most straightforward and narrative, with tunes like "$29.00" and "Christmas Card From a Hooker in Minneapolis" reading like dimestore detective novels. In a customary nod to tradition, he delivers a marvelously stentorian version of Bernstein's "Somewhere." Blue Valentine songs.

The 1973 album that introduced a young singer-songwriter to the world at large is a far cry from the wonderfully twisted sonic landscape that would define "Swordfishtrombones" a decade later. The Waits of "Closing Time" was a barroom balladeer too, but one who fit neatly into the early-'70s folk-rock, singer-songwriter paradigm ("Closing Time's opener "Ol' '55," in fact, was covered by the Eagles on their first album). The arrangements here are straightforward, piano-based affairs that present the songs with a minimum of fuss.

Backed by a coterie of accomplished players, including the guitarist Marc Ribot, the bassist Larry Clark, and the drummer Richie Hayward, Tom Waits growls, warbles, and clowns his way through a succession of freewheeling live performances, recorded throughout Europe and the U.S. as part of a characteristically idiosyncratic concert film released in 1988.
Included are songs from his three groundbreaking early '80s albums, "Swordfishtrombones”, "Rain Dogs, and “Franks Wild Years."