This one is a recent purchase, filling a gap in my Waits collection. It's often seen as the third in a series which started with Swordfishtrombones and Rain Dogs.
I've listened to it several times over the past couple of weeks, but have been diverted by efforts to rid the nation of the evil Tory government, so I haven't put pen to paper before now.
I think this one is rapidly becoming one of my favourite Waits albums, feeling like it contains all the elements you'd expect, with all the quality too.
There are several rock solid classics - the masterpiece Cold, Cold Ground, Waits vocals smoothly accompanied by an accordion, the lovely Innocent When You Dream, both as a gentle ballad to end the album and as a drunken barroom drawl, opener Hang On St Christopher, a lovely clanky megaphone-Tom song, as well as the similar Telephone Call From Istanbul.
There are also much gentler moments in Temptation, Yesterday Is Here, More Than Rain, quite discordant parts (Frank's Theme and I'll Be Gone) and a wonderful swing section, with Waits channelling his inner Sinatra in Straight To The Top, followed by I'll Take New York, feeling like the sound of Sinatra's New York, New York gradually self-destructing.
It's billed as a romantic opera (un operache romantico) although I'm struggling to follow a narrative - but there is a link there, even just that the whole thing feels greater than the sum of its parts.
It's not the easiest Waits album I've listened to, but it feels one of the more rewarding, delivering more with every listen. It's predecessors felt like Waits in transition, this one feels he got there.
4* - another triumph for a re-invented Tom Waits
Comments