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"...Take A Rusty Nail
And Scratch Your Initials On My Arms..."
Last reissued February 1993
by Elektra Records on CD in a jewel case with 20-page booklet and a lovely Zal
Schreiber Remaster (done at Atlantic Studios in New York) – this new March 2018
variant now comes at us on Anti Records – home to his music since "Mule
Variations" in 1999. You get a card digipak, a 24-page booklet and best of
all - a new upgraded Remaster (with artist involvement) done at Infrasonic
Mastering in California by Peter Lyman that gives this great album a genuinely
improved audio scrub-up. And man - am I one excited little 2018 Easter Bunny!
In fact between 1973 and
1980 - Tom Waits put out a string of seven fabulous albums on Asylum Records - and
I've long argued a case for owning the whole damn shooting match. But if I was
dragged through a thorn bush packed with wasp nests in my delightful and
beautifully proportioned altogether and unless I named a meisterwerk I'd be
dragged back again but this time smeared in natural honey and crushed bits of
Cadbury’s Crunchie - 1978's "Blue Valentine" would be my desert
island disc.
Everything about this record
is magical to me (the trio of "Small Change", "Foreign
Affairs" and "Heartattack And Vine" gave it a good run for the
money too) because this is where his Bukowski persona gelled in every way. The
whimsical tunes - the jagged rhythms - the astonishing and knowing lyrics -
even finding space to evoke beauty amidst the rubble, used needles and
down-at-heel street types ("Kentucky Avenue"). I love this album and
as the vinyl has become a known rarity since its release - this remastered CD,
DL and Vinyl LP reissue gives me another excuse to extol its divinity-like
healing properties. Here are the red shoes at the drugstore...
UK released Friday, 23 March
2018 - "Blue Valentine" by TOM WAITS on Anti 7570-2 (Barcode 8714092757026)
is a straightforward CD Remaster of the 10-track 1978 LP and plays out as
follows (49:37 minutes):
1. Somewhere (From
"West Side Story") [Side 1]
2. Red Shoes By The
Drugstore
3. Christmas Card From A
Hooker In Minneapolis
4. Romeo Is Bleeding
5. $29.00
6. Wrong Side Of The Road
[Side 2]
7. Whistlin' Past The
Graveyard
8. Kentucky Avenue
9. A Sweet Little Bullet
From A Pretty Blue Gun
10. Blue Valentines
Tracks 1 to 10 are his fifth
studio album "Blue Valentine" (6th LP overall) - released November
1978 in the USA on Asylum Records 6E-162 and December 1978 in the UK on Asylum
K 53088. Produced by BONES HOWE - it peaked at No. 181 in the USA but didn't
chart in the UK (the lady slumped over the Thunderbird car on the rear sleeve
is his then girlfriend Rickie Lee Jones).
TOM WAITS –Vocals (All
Tracks), Acoustic Piano (Tracks 3 and 8), Electric Guitar (Tracks 4, 5, 6, 7, 9
and 10)
GERGE DUKE as DA WILLIE
GANGA – Yamaha Electric Piano (Track 2) and Yamaha Electric Grand Piano (Tracks
3 and 5)
ROLAND BAUTISTA – Electric
Guitar (Tracks 2, 5)
“Shine” ROBINSON – Electric
Guitar (Track 9)
RAY CRAWFORD – Electric
Guitar (Tracks 4, 6 and Solo on Track 10)
CHARLES KYNARD – Organ
(Tracks 4, 6)
HAROLD BATTISTE – Piano
(Tracks 7 and 9
FRANK VICARI – Tenor
Saxophone (Tracks 4, 6)
HERBERT HARDESTY – Tenor
Saxophone (Tracks 7 and 9)
JIM HUGHART – Double Bass
(Tracks 4, 6)
BYRON MILLER – Bass (Tracks
2, 5)
SCOTT EDWARDS – Bass (Tracks
7 and 9)
RICK LAWSON - Drums (Tracks
2, 5)
CHIP WHITE – Drums (Tracks 4,
6)
EARL PALMER – Drums (Tracks
7and 9)
BOBBYE HALL – Congas (Track
4)
BOB ALCIVAR – Conducted and
Arranged Orchestra on Track 8
The 1993 CD reissue comes
with an unusually classy 20-page booklet filled with those all-important and all-consuming
lyrics but no photos unfortunately. Here we don’t really get much more (24
pages), except of course a slightly different re-issue credits page and the
centre-page spread reflecting the photograph on the LP’s inner gatefold. But we
do get is a new Remaster supervised by TOM WAITS, KATHLEEN BRENNAN and KARL
DERFLER with mastering done by the award-winning PETER LYMAN at his Infrasonic
Mastering Studios in California. In keeping with the lush production values
Bones Howe gave the album in the first place - this transfer sounds beautiful
in every way. There's very little hiss but loads of presence and body and at
times the intimacy is spine tingling - a gorgeous job done...
It opens with Bernstein's
"Somewhere" from West Side Story - strings and his
gargled-gravel-for-breakfast vocals - a perfect start to this lounge lizard of
an LP. "...There's a dark huddle at the bus stop...umbrellas arranged in a
sad bouquet..." - the lyrics to "Red Shoes By The Drugstore" are
typical of his observational brilliance - scenes are full of rain-washed
sidewalks - dogs baying at the moon and Santa Claus drunk in the ski room. Even
better is "Christmas Card From A Hooker In Minneapolis" which gives
us a pregnant 'lady of the night' living on 9th street above a dirty book store
who has quit drinking whiskey (while her old man works out down at the track)
but has misplaced her Little Anthony and The Imperials album. Waits songs are
like this - you laugh one moment - but the next you think about that someone
with all their hopes and dreams and how his conduit music has chronicled their
shot at happiness - not laughed at them - but told their story with heart and
an admiration that isn't some politician condescending.
"…They all know they
could be like Romeo…if they only had the guts…" - Waits croaks admiringly
on a sleazy "Romeo Is Bleeding" – a tale about a street rat who puts
out cigarettes in his hand but comes a cropper when he tackles the law.
Bleeding now in his car – Romeo finally ends up on the balcony of a local movie
house that has Jimmy Cagney doing his tough guy Mobster routine on an oldies
re-run. Romeo watches in admiration and dies without a whimper. Side 1 ends on
a long slow jazz-shuffle masterpiece – all caressed high-hats and rolling piano
notes - the barroom slink of "$29.00". Waits sets-the-scene with lyrics
like "...it's cold back in Chicago...but in Los Angeles it's worse...when
all you got is $29.00 and an alligator purse..." And then rubs sand in the
ointment when a shyster convinces the girl of the story that he knows a good
hotel in West Hollywood – smiling like a good Samaritan as he plays Pharaoh
Sanders on his 8-track thinking about his future financial reimbursements...
Songs like "Whistlin
Past The Graveyard" and "A Sweet Little Bullet From A Pretty Blue
Gun" gives us more of the same - but the tune that genuinely moves me to
tears is "Kentucky Avenue". Our family has a son with Autism who is
25 now – each of us having clocked up a lifetime of hurt and pain that is part
and parcel with this impenetrable condition. And somehow hooking into that -
there's something about the lyrics to this cry for understanding "...I'll
steal a hacksaw from my Dad...and cut the braces from your legs...and we'll
bury them tonight in the cornfield..." that slaughters me every time. This
is a song where someone take the spokes from a young boy’s wheelchair and then "...
we'll hop a freight train in the hall...and we'll slide down the drain...all
the way to New Orleans in the fall…" Beautiful and poetic – like TW’s soul.
A rare and precious talent -
mad as a camel on LSD that spits twice as much - Tom Waits is all these things.
But what gets me is that he does just that - all the greats do - they get to you - and his 1978 album
"Blue Valentine" still does.
Could these 2018 reissues
have been Deluxe Editions with Bonus Tracks and Unreleased – of course! But
given the immense Audio upgrade – I’d still say they’re worth the money and are
absolute must-haves for fans.
Explore this man’s work –
the payoff will be immense and expect to be at that shopping basket for the
other six...
TOM WAITS - March
2018
Reissue Series of CDs,
LPs and Downloads on Anti Records
All CDs are in Card
Digipaks, come with Booklets and Pic CDs but No Extras
"Closing Time"
and "The Heart Of Saturday Night" released Friday, 9 March 2018
- The others all
released Friday, 23 March 2018
1. "Closing Time" (1973) - Anti 7565-2
(Barcode 8714092756524) - CD/LP is Anti 7565-1 (Barcode 8714092756517)
2. "The Heart Of Saturday Night"
(1974) - Anti 7566-2 (Barcode 8714092756623)/LP due May 2018
3. "Nighthawks At The Diner" (1975
Live Double onto 1CD) - Anti 7567-2 (Barcode 8714092756722)/LP due May 2018
4. "Small Change" (1976) - Anti 7568-2
(Barcode 8714092756821)/LP due May 2018
5. "Foreign Affairs" (1977) - Anti
7569-2 (Barcode 8714092756920)
6. "Blue Valentine" (1978) - Anti
7570-2 (Barcode 8714092757026)
7. "Heartattack And Vine"(1980) - Anti
7571-2 (Barcode 8714092757125)
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