Very eclectic, very wierd, very experimental, sometimes hard to listen to...but, a genius. Not for the unadventurous when it comes to music. In the same vein as Frank Zappa, Captain Beefheart etc...his later work like Alice, Blood Money, and Mule variations are much more mellow and digestible than his early 70's and 80's albums. Hard to catagorize...he is just a completely original singer/songwriter, and is a legend ala Dylan to alot of people. But he is nothing like Dylan, at all.
Born in Pomona, California (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomona%2C_California) to parents of Scottish, Irish, and Norwegian descent, Tom Waits was working as a doorman at the Heritage nightclub in San Diego in the early '70s, where artists of every genre performed. An avid fan of many writers and musicians, among them Bob Dylan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Dylan), Lord Buckley (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_Buckley), Hoagy Carmichael (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoagy_Carmichael), Marty Robbins (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marty_Robbins), Raymond Chandler (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Chandler), and Stephen Foster (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Foster), Waits began developing his own idiosyncratic musical style, combining song (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song) and monologue (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/monologue).
He took his newly formed act to Monday nights at the Troubadour in Los Angeles, where musicians from all over stood in line all day to get the opportunity to perform on-stage that night. Shortly thereafter, in 1971, Waits began his recording career after he relocated to Los Angeles (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Angeles%2C_California) and signed to Asylum Records (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asylum_Records) with Herb Cohen (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Herb_Cohen&action=edit), who was also the manager of Frank Zappa (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Zappa). He was 21 years old.
After numerous abortive recording sessions, Waits's first record, the melancholic, country (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Country_music)-tinged Closing Time (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closing_Time_%28album%29), was issued in 1973. While it received warm reviews, he did not gain widespread attention until his Ol' 55 was recorded by his labelmates the Eagles (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eagles) in 1974 for their On the Border (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/on_the_Border) album.
He began touring and opening for such artists as Charlie Rich (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlie_Rich), Martha and the Vandellas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martha_and_the_Vandellas) and Frank Zappa (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Zappa). Waits gained increasing critical acclaim and a loyal cult audience with his subsequent albums.The Heart of Saturday Night (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_of_Saturday_Night), released in 1974, showed Waits's roots as a nightclub singer, with half-spoken and half-crooned ballads, often accompanied with a jazz (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jazz) backup band.
The 1975 album Nighthawks at the Diner (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nighthawks_at_the_Diner), recorded in a studio with a small audience to capture the ambiance of a live show, captures this phase of his career, including the lengthy spoken interludes between songs that punctuated his live act. Regarding his music of this era, Waits reported that "I wasn't thrilled by Blue Cheer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Cheer), so I found an alternative, even if it was Bing Crosby (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bing_Crosby)."[1] (http://www.keeslau.com/TomWaitsSupplement/Quotes/influences.htm)
Small Change (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Change) (1976), featuring famed drummer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drummer) Shelly Manne (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelly_Manne), was more jazz influenced, and songs such as "The Piano Has Been Drinking" and "Bad Liver and a Broken Heart" cemented Waits's hard-living reputation, with a lyrical style that owed influence to Raymond Chandler (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Chandler) and Charles Bukowski (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Bukowski). Foreign Affairs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Affairs_%28album%29) (1977) and Blue Valentine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Valentine) (1978) were in a similar vein, but showed further refinement of his artistic voice. It was around this time that Waits had a high-profile romantic relationship with Rickie Lee Jones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickie_Lee_Jones) (who appears on the album cover of Blue Valentine).
It was an incredibly prolific period for Waits, establishing his reputation as a visionary songwriter. 1980 saw the release of Heartattack and Vine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heartattack_and_Vine). Though not entirely unprecedented, the album's gritty rhythm and blues (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhythm_and_blues) sound was different for Waits, and foreshadowed the major changes in his music that would follow several years later. The same year, he began a long working relationship with Francis Ford Coppola (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Ford_Coppola), who asked Waits to provide music for his film One From The Heart (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/one_From_The_Heart). Waits worked with singer/songwriter Crystal Gayle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crystal_Gayle) as his vocal foil for the album.
Waits began his acting career with his appearance in Sylvester Stallone (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvester_Stallone)'s 1978 film Paradise Alley and later appeared in Coppola's The Outsiders (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Outsiders_%28film%29). He starred in Jim Jarmusch (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Jarmusch)'s Down By Law (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Down_By_Law_%28film%29) in 1986, and has played supporting roles in the films Rumble Fish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rumble_Fish), The Cotton Club (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cotton_Club), Short Cuts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_Cuts), Mystery Men (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mystery_Men), Coffee and Cigarettes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffee_and_Cigarettes) (as himself) and Dracula (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dracula) (as Dracula's insane thrall Renfield (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renfield)).
<DIV class=editsection style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px">[edit (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tom_Waits&action=edit&section=2)]</DIV>
<A name=1980s></A>
<H2>1980s</H2>
In August 1980, Waits married Kathleen Brennan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathleen_Brennan), whom he had met on the set of One from the Heart. Brennan is regularly credited as co-author of many songs on his later albums, and Waits often cites her as a major influence on his work. She introduced him to the music of Captain Beefheart (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Beefheart): despite having shared a manager with Beefheart in the 1970s, Waits says "I became more acquainted with him when I got married." [2] (http://www.keeslau.com/TomWaitsSupplement/Interviews/04-oct-magnet.htm) Waits would later describe his relationship with Brennan as a paradigm shift (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradigm_shift) in his musical development.
After leaving Asylum Records (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asylum_Records) for Island Records (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_Records), Waits released Swordfishtrombones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swordfishtrombones) in 1983, a record which marked a sharp turn in Waits's output, and which gave rise to his reputation as a musical maverick (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maverick). Apart from Captain Beefheart (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Beefheart) and some of Dr. John (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._John)'s early output, there was little precedent in popular music for Swordfishtrombones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swordfishtrombones) or equally idiosyncratic albums, Rain Dogs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rain_Dogs) (1985) and Franks Wild Years (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franks_Wild_Years) (1987).
Waits had earlier played either piano (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano) or guitar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guitar), but he began tiring of these instruments, saying, "Your hands are like dogs, going to the same places they've been. You have to be careful when playing is no longer in the mind but in the fingers, going to happy places. You have to break them of their habits or you don't explore, you only play what is confident and pleasing. I'm learning to break those habits by playing instruments I know absolutely nothing about, like a bassoon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bassoon) or a waterphone (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterphone)." [3] (http://www.keeslau.com/TomWaitsSupplement/Instruments/contrabassoon.htm)
The instrumentation and orchestration (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestration) in his later albums were often quite eclectic.[4] (http://www.keeslau.com/TomWaitsSupplement/Menus/instruments-frameset.htm) Waits's self-described "Junkyard Orchestra" included wheezing pump organs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pump_organ), clattering percussion (sometimes reminiscent of the music of Harry Partch (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Partch)), bleary horn sections (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horn_section) (often featuring Ralph Carney (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Carney), and taking their cues from brass bands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brass_band) or soul music (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul_music)), nearly atonal (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atonal) guitar (perhaps best typified by Marc Ribot (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Ribot)'s contributions) and obsolete instruments. Waits is particularly fond of a damaged, unpredictable chamberlin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamberlin); recent albums have featured the little-used stroh violin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroh_violin).
Along with a new instrumental approach, Waits gradually altered his singing style to sound less like the late-night crooner (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crooner) of the 70s, instead adopting a number of techniques: a gravelly sound reminiscent of Howlin' Wolf (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howlin%27_Wolf) and Captain Beefheart (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Beefheart), a booming, feral bark, or a strained, nearly shrieking falsetto (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsetto) Waits jokingly describes as his Prince (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_%28artist%29) voice. Tom Moon describes Waits's voice as a "broad-spectrum assault weapon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_weapon)".[5] (http://www.keeslau.com/TomWaitsSupplement/Interviews/04-oct-harpmagazine.html)
His songwriting (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Songwriting) shifted as well, becoming somewhat more abstract and embracing a number of styles largely ignored in pop music (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pop_music), including primal blues (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blues), cabaret (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabaret) stylings, rhumbas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhumba), theatrical approaches in the style of Kurt Weill (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Weill), tangos (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tango_music), early country music (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Country_music) and European folk music (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folk_music), as well as the Tin Pan Alley (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tin_Pan_Alley)-era songs that influenced his early output. He also recorded a few spoken word (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoken_word) pieces influenced by Ken Nordine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Nordine)'s "word jazz" records of the 1950s.
Swordfishtrombones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swordfishtrombones), Rain Dogs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rain_Dogs) and Franks Wild Years (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franks_Wild_Years) can retrospectively be seen as a trilogy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trilogy) of loose concept albums (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concept_album), following a sailor as he leaves the familiar comfort of home, sees the world, and returns. The last of these albums was also adapted as an off-Broadway (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Off-Broadway) musical (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_theater), which Waits co-wrote with Brennan — and starred in, in a successful run at Chicago (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago)'s famed Steppenwolf Theater (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steppenwolf_Theater_Company). This was the first of several theatre (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theatre) collaborations Waits would undertake. With his wife, Waits also wrote and performed in Big Time, a surreal (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surreal) concert movie and soundtrack (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soundtrack) released in 1988 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988).
<DIV class=editsection style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px">[edit (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tom_Waits&action=edit&section=3)]</DIV>
<A name=1990s></A>
<H2>1990s</H2>
In 1990 Waits collaborated with photographer Sylvia Plachy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvia_Plachy). Her book, Sylvia Plachy's Unguided Tour includes a short Tom Waits record to accompany the photographs and text.
Waits appeared on Primus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primus_%28band%29)' 1991 album, Sailing the Seas of Cheese (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailing_the_Seas_of_Cheese) as the voice of "Tommy the Cat", which exposed him to a new audience in alternative rock (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_rock). This was the first of several collaborations between Waits and the group; Les Claypool (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Claypool) (Primus' singer, songwriter and bassist) would appear on several subsequent Waits releases.
In 1991 Waits also had a featured role in the film At Play In The Fields Of The Lord (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=At_Play_In_The_Fields_Of_The_Lord& action=edit).
Bone Machine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bone_Machine) was released in 1992. The stark record featured a great deal of percussion and guitar (with little piano or sax), marking another change in Waits's sound. Critic Steve Huey (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Steve_Huey&action=edit) calls it "perhaps Tom Waits' most cohesive album ... a morbid, sinister nightmare (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nightmare), one that applied the quirks of his experimental '80s classics to stunningly evocative – and often harrowing – effect ... Waits' most affecting and powerful recording, even if it isn't his most accessible."[6] (http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:xsyvad1kv8w6) Bone Machine was awarded a Grammy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammy), and the Ramones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramones) later recorded a version of the album's memorable single, "I Don't Wanna Grow Up." The Pixies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixies) had earlier written a song called "Bone Machine" (from Surfer Rosa (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surfer_Rosa)), though it's unclear if Waits borrowed the term from them, or invented it independently.
Waits wrote and conducted the music for Jim Jarmusch's 1993 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993) film Night on Earth (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_on_Earth_%281991_film%29), which was released as an album. The Black Rider (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Black_Rider_%28album%29) is the result of a theatrical collaboration between Waits, director Robert Wilson (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Wilson_%28director%29) and writer William S. Burroughs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_S._Burroughs).
Mule Variations (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mule_Variations) was issued in 1999, and also won a Grammy. It was Waits's first release for Anti Records, and his first to feature a turntablist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turntablist), though, predictably, the instrument is used in an offbeat manner.
<DIV class=editsection style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px">[edit (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tom_Waits&action=edit&section=4)]</DIV>
<A name=2000s></A>
<H2>2000s</H2>
Singer John P. Hammond (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_P._Hammond)'s Wicked Grin (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wicked_Grin&action=edit) was issued in 2001. Hammond and Waits are close friends, and the album is a collection of cover songs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cover_songs), originally written by Waits, who appears on most songs (playing guitar, piano or offering backing vocals). There is also a version of the traditional hymn "I Know I've Been Changed", which Hammond and Waits perform as a duet.
2001 also saw the release of trumpeter Dave Douglas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Douglas)'s Witness, which includes the 25-minute track, "Mahfouz", named for Egyptian (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egypt) writer Naguib Mahfouz (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naguib_Mahfouz). Waits is featured in the song, reading an excerpt from Mahfouz's work.
In 2002, Waits simultaneously released two albums, Alice (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_%28album%29) and Blood Money (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_Money_%28album%29). Both were the fruits of theatrical collaborations with Wilson. The former was originally intended as a musical (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_theater) play about Lewis Carroll (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis_Carroll), and the latter was an interpretation of Georg Büchner (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_B%C3%BCchner)'s unfinished Woyzeck (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woyzeck). The two albums revisit the tango, Tin Pan Alley, and spoken word influences of Swordfishtrombones, while the lyrics are both profoundly cynical and melancholy, as the titles "Misery is the River of the World" and "No One Knows I'm Gone" make clear. (The song "God's Away on Business" from the album Blood Money is part of the 2005 documentary Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enron:_The_Smartest_Guys_in_the_Room), and is on the film's soundtrack.)
Real Gone (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_Gone) was released in 2004. While more refined than Bone Machine and perhaps more commercially viable than Alice or Blood Money, its sound is still experimental, and it is his only album thus far completely lacking in piano. Waits beatboxes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beatboxing) on the opening track, "Top of the Hill", and most of the album's songs begin with Waits's "vocal percussion" improvisations. It is also more rock-oriented, with less blues influence than he has previously demonstrated, and it contains two explicitly political song — a first for Waits. In the album-closing "The Day After Tomorrow" he adopts the persona (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persona) of a soldier writing home that he is disillusioned with war and is thankful to be leaving. The song doesn't mention the Iraq war (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_war), and, as Tom Moon writes, "it could be the voice of a Civil War (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_War) soldier singing a lonesome late-night dirge." Waits himself does describe the song as an something of an "elliptical" protest song (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protest_song) about the Iraqi invasion, however. [7] (http://www.anti.com/press.php?id=1&pid=501) Thom Jurek (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Thom_Jurek&action=edit) describes "The Day After Tomorrow" as "one of the most insightful and understated anti-war (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-war) songs to have been written in decades. It contains not a hint of banality or sentiment in its folksy articulation." [8] (http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:z7d5vwnwa9uk~T1). The album's second song, "Hoist That Rag" also has clear anti-war overtones.
He now lives in Sonoma County, California (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonoma_County%2C_California) with his wife and children.