Music Review: Bad As Me — Tom Waits

I’ll declare an interest in the interest of journalistic integrity. I love Tom Waits. He can put out an album of handclaps and growls and it will still be amazing. Oh wait… he did (Real Gone). It was love at first hear. Those times when one song will inspire the buying of a full back catalogue. It was an excellent singer songwriter, vaguely in my milieu, called David Ford (davidford.mu) who inspired my devotion. So no matter what Tom Waits’ new album sounds like, chances are, I was going to love it. I took my pennies down to Rotate This (big shout out — 20 years and still going strong) and bought the vinyl the day it came out — well actually a couple of days before (shhh).

It starts in a bombastic mood and rarely relents. The opener, “Chicago”, is full of horns, skiffle guitars and frenetic beats — playing with stereo. It’s disorientating, yet retains the warmth that was the genius of Real Gone seven years ago. Lyrically, it’s divine (compare on contrast with Coldplay’s new album out the same day). Whether he’s reeling off evocative names “Gunplay Maxwell/Flat Nose George/Ice Pick Ed Newcomb/on a slab in a morgue” or “the dog is in the kitchen/and the war drags on/the trees wait by the freeway/all the money is gone” on “Talking At The Same Time.” I could go on with lyrics — instead by the vinyl with a lyric book inside, crack open the bourbon (that’s what Mr. Waits would do youtube.com/watch?v=TpV3ckRaauE&feature=related and revel in the stories. 

It’s a more concise album than sprawling Real Gone, and the better for it. The songs are shorter than normal — most coming in under four minutes, and less songs. But it’s his power to transport you into a life of motels and riding the trains of hobos and highways. Death remains a constant preoccupation: “roll my vertebrae out like dice/let my skull be a home for the mice”. The curveballs are “Pay Me”, a ballad that could have come off Blue Valentine, and “Back in the Crowd” which seems so familiar you think you can sing along. 

It’s woozy and drunken, fun and frightening. It’s essential — for everyone. 



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Photo Courtesy: Jesse Dylan