Thomas Alan Waits
Born: December 7, 1949
Death: Oh, far from it. No other musician may have created as much fanaticism among his faithful or confusion from the masses. There is no dispute to the trail of great art that he has left over the past 35 years. What no one can seem to get to the bottom of is who this man truly is - and Mr. Waits seems to like it that way.
I recently finished Barney Hoskyns' excellent, and unauthorized biography, Lowside of the Road : A Life of Tom Waits. An interesting read, to be sure, but confounding none the less. Despite Hoskyns' long resume of work in the field of music journalism (most famously for NME and Uncut, two of the UK's most prestigious magazines), he was unable to get Tom to cooperate. This, in itself, is not unusual, as Mr. Waits is famous for his reticence in adding facts to his own story - he likes his privacy, he's fine without the populace knowing everything about him, and he really doesn't seem to care if anyone outside of his "Circle of Trust" gets as close as seeing him live in concert. What is fascinating, is the number of collaborators, producers, and musicians who have worked with him over the years who were instructed by Tom's camp to NOT cooperate with Mr. Hoskyns. The appendix of the book has an eye-opening section wherein the author reprints e-mail communications between he and multiple sources who "after speaking with Tom and Kathleen (more on her in a second)" refused to comment.
This would be fine and good if everyone thought that Waits was an asshole. The truth is, almost everyone who has worked with him can't say enough about the experience. It's fascinating to think about how much sway Mrs. Waits may have over him and his privacy - at least that's the picture that one is left with upon completing the book, and one of the book's great unanswered questions.
Any great artist who reaches some level of fame and fortune will attract rabid fans, ready to take any piece that they can grab. To criticize Waits for wanting to protect himself and his family is quite short-sighted. Think about what he has been able to do - shelter himself, his wife, and his privacy - from the prying eyes of our ever-more voyeuristic society. Now, no one is going to argue that Waits isn't as famous as, say, Jay-Z or Bruce Springsteen or The Black Eyed Peas (despite the fact that his art trumps all of theirs), so it's not exactly like the paparazzi will leave coked up Lindsay's side to try to find the Waits compound somewhere in California. BUT, this point gives one pause into what it means to be worshiped like many of the musicians that we all care about are. I am as guilty as the next super fan about my fanaticism of all things Waitsian, but I think we all need to take a step back and consider what it might be like to live under the fish-eye lens for a while. As we like to say, don't poke the bear, don't rattle the cage...
So, what of Waits' work? A more complex and varied oeuvre is unlikely to be found over the past 3 decades. Starting as a "hobo poet of the gutter" (and supposedly stealing much of his "image" from the writings of Bukowski and Kerouac), he penned some of the most touching "grand weepers" of the 1970s, but always with his own touch. That touch, for many, is what keeps them from getting too close to his music - namely, his voice. Falling somewhere between the sound of a hound dog gargling gasoline and a carnival barker who's just coughed up phlegm littered with glass, the "Waits Grumble" is an acquired taste. Once you let it roll around in your skull for a while, though, it isn't likely to leave quickly. There is much beauty in that haggard instrument of his. Listen to "On the Nickel" from Heartattack & Vine - the lyrics, in the hands of a "prettier" singer would be enough to bring anyone to tears, but it's Waits' voice that lends this tale of lost innocence among the population of Los Angeles' down-and-out Fifth Street just the right dirty sheen. Knowing something about his own background (a child of divorce, alcoholic father, religious mother), it's hard not to imagine that Waits is singing about some of his own lost childhood when he sings of "all the little boys who never combed their hair/lined up all around the block, on the nickel, over there". Could it have been better for Tom growing up in a fully intact family unit? Maybe. Has it been better for his art that he didn't? There's the great conundrum for many artists.
Waits could have rested on his drunken poet laurels, continued to crank out album after album of woozy piano ballads, and probably would have killed himself in the process. Instead, he reinvented himself with what is easily one of popular music's great trilogies - the "junkyard band" sound of Swordfishtrombones, Rain Dogs, and Frank's Wild Years. Listen to "16 Shells From a Thirty-Ought-Six" from Swordfishtrombones - was that an anvil that someone just hit? Is that a car horn, or a trombone? What about "Cemetery Polka" from Rain Dogs? Strange lyrics, strange calliope, odd and sparse instrumentation, but downright genius. Then there's the out-of-tune piano line from "Tango Till They're Sore", the xylophone line from "Singapore", the crusty Victrola sound of "Innocent When You Dream (78)", even the deranged falsetto scream of "Temptation". This, by no means, is "easy" music to listen to. It challenges the listener, but there is ever so much to gain.
As 2006's Orphans shows, there's no sign of Mr. Waits slowing down anytime soon. He may not tour as much as his fans would like (would it have killed him to come to Buffalo instead of Mobile or Tulsa?). One fact remains - the man is a private, quirky genius. And the faithful will continue to fall out of the window with confetti in our hair for him time after time...
Happykidney's Playlist for Tuesday, September 8, 2009:
A Tom Waits Primer:
"Martha" - Closing Time
"Eggs and Sausage (In A Cadillac With Susan Michelson) - Nighthawks At the Diner (or, preferably, a live version from one of the myriad bootlegs that float around out there from the late 1970s)
"Invitation to the Blues" - Small Change
"Tom Traubert's Blues" - Small Change
"Kentucky Avenue" - Blue Valentine (if this one doesn't get you, you have no heart - a lament for lost childhood and childhood's mysteries)
"Burma Shave" - Foreign Affairs (but, again, preferably from bootleg - Austin City Limits 1978 is a personal favorite - complete with whining muted trumpet and Tom's own special effects of a car engine)
"Heartattack and Vine" - Heartattack & Vine
"Broken Bicycles" - Original Soundtrack from One From the Heart
"In The Neighborhood" - Swordfishtrombones
"Jockey Full of Bourbon" - Rain Dogs
"Way Down in the Hole" - Frank's Wild Years
"Falling Down" - Big Time
"Eyeball Kid" - Mule Variations
"Alice" - Alice
"Hoist That Rag" - Real Gone
"Lie To Me" - Orphans
"Lucinda" - Orphans
Until next time, be well...
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