Tom Waits for No Man

I know I’ve been posting a bunch tonight, but I needed to do some catching up.  In any case, I found this (albeit 7 months late) cool video cover of Waits’ “Back in the Good Old World” performed by none other than the ultimate trader, art work genius and all around interesting fellow Pascal Fricke (AKA WaitsWatcher).  I thought it would be a good way to sign off for the night so enjoy:

A few weeks back I posted a link to some classic Tom Waits photos on Everyone I Shot Is Dead. Well, your comments prompted the artist, Deborah Chesher, to follow up with some more great shots, this time from the Troubadour from August, 1975. The last shot is a true classic.

She is also putting together a book of rock and roll photos also titled Everyone I Shot Is Dead. The book will open with a photo of Tom Waits.

Update: Sorry, I got a bit confused on the book. There are actually two different releases. The first is a book entitled Everyone I Shot is Dead is a collection of stories and photos of musicians photographed by Deborah Chesher who are no longer with us. Additionally, she will be releasing a series of prints of which Tom Waits will be one. Sorry for the confusion.

Eccentric musician and former member of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Kid Congo Powers, has a very unusual cover of Waits’ “Virginia Avenue” on his latest album Solo Cholo.  The track is available for sample and purchase at Emusic.  The whole album is available for purchase at his label’s site, New York Night Train.

Update 10/1/2006: This track originally appeared on New Coat of Paint: Songs of Tom Waits.  In my defense, I hated this album and completely forgot about this track.  However, now that I’ve heard this track again, I may dig it up from the archives again.  Thanks Jarlath.

 Mr. Waits always seems to be very popular among the Broadway set.  A new show entitled Looking for the Heart of Saturday Night will feature James Naughton performing the music of Tom Waits among others:

Two-time Tony Award winner James Naughton will appear in Looking for the Heart of Saturday Night as a “Monday Night Live” fundraising event at La Jolla Playhouse Oct. 23.

Source: Playbill News: Chicago & City of Angels Star Sings in Looking for the Heart of Saturday Night at La Jolla

There’s more and more information being released about the upcoming Orphans release.  First, there’s an extended intro about Orphans written by Waits out on Anti’s site which includes tidbits like this:

Kathleen and I wanted the record to be like emptying our pockets on the table after an evening of gambling, burglary, and cow tipping. We enjoy strange couplings, that’s how we got together. We wanted Orphans to be like a shortwave radio show where the past is sequenced with the future, consisting of things you find on the ground, in this world and no world, or maybe the next world. Whatever you imagine that to be.

Source: ANTI- Album - Orphans

Additionally, it appears there may be two versions of the album.  Amazon.co.uk has two versions of the album listed for pre-sale one for £23.99 and £33.99.  Current speculation is that the “deluxe” edition will contain the 94 page booklet.

Finally, one version of the album is now listed on Amazon.com for $39.97.

Thanks to Jarlath and the Eyeball Kid.

Tom Waits has donated an autographed jacket to a celebrity auction being run by the ACLU of Southern California.  The corduroy Levis jacket features an inscription from Waits that reads, “To the new owner: I raised a lot of hell in this jacket, but it’s a lucky one. My wife wants me to get rid of it cause its all ripped up. May the new wearer wear it well”.  The auction winner will also win a signed copy of the Zoetrope: All Story magazine Waits put together last year.

The auction is being run on Ebay.com and at the time of posting, the winning bid is $500.  The auction will end on September 26th, 2006 at 10:00 PDT.

The film Wristcutters, which features a performance of Tom Waits, will be shown during the Raindance Film Festival in London on September 30th.  Tickets are available for purchase here.

According to the Wristcutters website, there are quite a few screenings coming up over the next few months so keep your eye’s open in a town near you.

Thanks to Jarlath for the heads up.

Anti- has released a track from the upcoming Orphans album for free download.  The track is entitled “Bottom of the World” which originally appeared on the soundtrack for the documentary film Long Gone.

In other Orphans news, the album is now available for sale at Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.ca for £23.99 and 50.99 CDN respectively.  There is no listing on Amazon.com yet.

Thanks for Jarlath and the Eyeball Kid for the heads up.

Broadway performer, Annie Golden, will bring her song cycle show Velvet Prison to Ars Nova in NYC on September 20th.  The performance will feature songs from Tom Waits.

[Via: PlayBill News]

OK, this post is really only for all of the hardcore Oklahoma Tom Waits fans, of which I may be the only one.   In any case, there is a young jazz harpist in town named Jessica Tate.  I saw her a couple of weeks back in Maker’s Cigar Bar.  During the performance, she played a very good but odd performance of “Blue Valentines”.  If you are in the area, you might try to find one of her rare performances.

 Stylus Magazine has put out a Top 10 list about the Nightmares of Tom Waits which is really about all of the really odd visuals from the songs of Waits:

“It’s one of those dreams where everyone you never wanted to see again, showed up,” Tom Waits once told an audience in his 1988 concert movie, Big Time. “It’s Uncle Phil. Shit, I owe him money! ” He spoke of the street corner Ninth and Hennepin, as a place where “all the donuts have names that sound like prostitutes,”with a flophouse where “all the rooms, they smell like diesel,” and “you take on the dreams of the ones who slept there.” Waits describes it all in his famous growl that’s oiled in cheap bourbon, L.A. smog, and scars from endless nights of hollering at the devil in SRO hotel rooms. And somehow he still makes you wish you were there with him.

Source: Top Ten Nightmares of Tom Waits - Staff Top 10 - Stylus Magazine

Pearl Jam covered “Picture in a Frame” during their show last night in Milan.  You can view the setlist and buy the whole show here.

Update (9/16/2006): There is a video now available on YouTube of the performance (quality’s not great, but you’ll get the idea):

Thanks to the Eyeball Kid for the heads up.

There is a new Tom Waits DVD entitled Tom Waits - Under Review 1971 - 1982 that will be released on November 13th.  There are no details about the specifics about this title, however the work is being created as part of the “Under Review” series from Chrome Dreams.  Chrome Dreams produces short documentaries about a wide variety of artists. The”Under Review” documentaries seem to provide artistic critique of an artist’s work during a particular period of time.  Other artists featured in the “Under Review” series include The Rolling Stones, Queen and Neil Young. At this time this DVD appears to be an Region 2 only release which means that us on the wrong side of the Atlantic will be out of luck.

Thanks to the Eyeball Kid for the heads up.

Here’s a review that I missed from the Cleveland Plain Dealer about the Akron and Cleveland double header shows. The last paragraph sums up how I felt at the two shows I made it to:

The later it got, the more the lines blurred between melody and mayhem, between fact and pulp fiction, between reality and neon-illuminated netherworld. In the harsh light of the next day, this dream doubleheader for Waits fans felt like a dream indeed.

Source: Shows by Tom Waits are worth the wait

 The HBO series, The Wire, is continuing to use the Waits tune “Way Down in the Hole”.  Previous seasons used performances by Blind Boys of Alabama and the Neville Brothers.  This year’s season will use a cover performed by Baltimore middle-school students.

Via: Hooked on ‘The Wire