Tom Waits Week: Things Get Weird (1983-1993)
It’s hard to even pick out representative tracks from this album, as it’s so diverse. “Cemetery Polka” is a legitimately funny song where the narrator talks about his problematic relatives. (“He has a mistress / she’s Puerto Rican / and I hear she has a wooden leg.”) “Time” is beautiful and sentimental, and if it doesn’t bring a tear to your eye, you’re a monster. Both “Rain Dogs” and “Anywhere I Lay My Head” focus on a man who’s lost his place but is making the best of it. I particularly like his voice on “Anywhere…” ,where Tom is basically just screaming out the lyrics. And in the spoken word “9th and Hennepin”, there are some amazing details about the seamy side of down. Personally, I will always love the line “All the donuts have names that sound like prostitutes”.
