Tom Waits Week: Things Get Weird (1983-1993)

Rain Dogs (1985) – This is a really quirky album. The song styles and subject matter are all over the board. Waits is experimenting as he goes here, and it results in a really strong finished product. Rod Stewart had a hit with a cover of “Downtown Train” from this album, and Paul Rudd wore a t-shirt printed with the album cover in the movie Knocked Up. You can imagine how I freaked out at that.