Tom Waits

And you can't find your waitress with a Geiger counter
She hates you and your friends and you just can't get served without her
And the box-office is drooling, and the bar stools are on fire
And the newspapers were fooling, and the ash-trays have retired
'Cause the piano has been drinking, the piano has been drinking
The piano has been drinking, not me, not me, not me, not me, not me

Thomas Alan Waits (born 7 December 1949) is an American singer-songwriter, composer, and actor. Waits has a distinctive voice, described by one critic as sounding "like it was soaked in a vat of bourbon, left hanging in the smokehouse for a few months, and then taken outside and run over with a car." With this trademark growl; his incorporation of pre-rock styles such as blues, jazz, and Vaudeville; and experimental tendencies verging on industrial music, Waits has built up a distinctive musical persona. He has worked as a composer for movies and musical plays and as a supporting actor in films, including The Fisher King, Bram Stoker's Dracula, and Short Cuts. He has been nominated for an Academy Award for his soundtrack work on One from the Heart.

Lyrically, Waits' songs are known for atmospheric portrayals of bizarre, seedy characters and places, although he has also shown a penchant for more conventional ballads. He has a cult following and has influenced subsequent songwriters despite having little radio or music video support. His songs are best-known to the general public in the form of cover versions by more visible artists—for example, "Jersey Girl," performed by Bruce Springsteen; "Downtown Train," performed by Rod Stewart; and "Ol' '55," performed by the Eagles. Although Waits' albums have met with mixed commercial success in his native United States, they have occasionally achieved gold album sales status in other countries. He has been nominated for a number of major music awards and has won Grammy Awards for two albums, Bone Machine and Mule Variations

The album I post today is his 1976 offering Small Change. The album featured famed drummer Shelly Manne, and was, like Waits' previous albums, heavily jazz influenced, with a lyrical style that owed influence to Raymond Chandler and Charles Bukowski as well as a vocal delivery influenced by Louis Armstrong. The music for the most part consists of Waits' hoarse, rough voice, set against a backdrop of piano, upright bass, drums and saxophone. The album's themes include those of desolation, deprivation, and, above all else, alcoholism. The cast of characters, which includes hookers, strippers and small-time losers, are for the most part, night-owls and drunks; people lost in a cold, urban world.

This is probably me my personal favourite of Tom Waits' albums. Keep an eye out, I'll be posting more. The man is a genius.

Artist: Tom Waits
Album: Small Change
Genre: Jazz, Blues, Rock
Official Website: http://www.anti.com/artists/view/1

1. "Tom Traubert's Blues (Four Sheets To The Wind In Copenhagen)"
2. "Step Right Up"
3. "Jitterbug Boy (Sharing A Curbstone With Chuck E. Weiss, Robert Marchese, Paul Body And The Mug And Artie)"
4. "I Wish I Was In New Orleans (In The Ninth Ward)"
5. "The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me) (An Evening With Pete King)"
6. "Invitation To The Blues"
7. "Pasties And A G-String (At The Two O'Clock Club)"
8. "Bad Liver And A Broken Heart (In Lowell)"
9. "The One That Got Away"
10. "Small Change (Got Rained On With His Own .38)"
11. "I Can't Wait To Get Off Work (And See My Baby On Montgomery Avenue)"

Download: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=VX4YEUQ0