Tom Waits

Waits is Waits is Waits. Why an ersatz when you can have the real thing? Quite surreal, I admit, but at the top of the list of, for want of a better expression, singer/songwriters. Not the easiest music or lyrics, dark, stark, troubling but never gratuitous, he spits at us all the violence, the absurdity and the pathetic chronic insanity of the "American Way of Life". Seems obvious most Americans can't recognize themselves in his work: his mirror is so close that some people only see the distortion.

Actually, even Tom Waits isn't Tom Waits any more. Check out Mule Variations, too much time spent at the Beverly Hills Hotel, not enough at that deadbeat bar on Hollywood Boulevard.

"I'll take it, with me when I go" Mule Variations.

Garfish, good choice. I too like Tom Waits and have many of his CDs. That doesn't mean Holly Cole's covers are not the "genuine" item. She does an excellent interpretation, and they stand on their own. I also like them. I also like Bob Dylan, but love Joan Baez's covers of Dylan on "Any Day Now". If the only person legit to sing a song is the original singer, music would be a lot poorer.

I'll stand by my post. Tom Waits is a song writing genius, but the CD of Holly Cole singing his songs has many beautifully done songs on it-- certainly different than Tom Waits singing his own works but still excellent in it's own right. And her "Temptations" CD reminded me a bit (just "a bit") of Jennifer Warnes doing Leonard Cohen's songs on "Famous Blue Raincoat". It's hardly unusual for an excellent singer to sing the songs of an excellent songwriter.

Dan Penn wrote (and sang) "At the Dark End of the Street"-- one of the greatest blues/soul songs ever written, IMO, but it took other singers to really bring it to life, again, IMO. Cheers. Craig