Some American

a considered opinion: tom waits - glitter and doom live

In the summer of 2008, Tom Waits embarked on a U.S tour. Given his sporadic touring schedule, I was understandably intrigued. However, given that the aim of the tour was apparently to avoid anything resembling a coast (with the exception of a brief foray into California), the closest date to me was in Cleveland, a solid 7-8 hour drive away. A friend of mine ardently insisted that we gather a group together for a road trip and buy tickets, long distances and hellacious drives through flat middle America be damned. For reasons that escape me now, I insisted that I couldn’t afford such a trip. Looking back, I can’t remember exactly what it was that I used that money for instead. It was doubtless wasted, at least in comparison to the good use that could have been made of it had I actually gotten my act together and made it to the show. As Glitter and Doom Live, his latest release compiled of performances taken from this tour, makes abundantly clear, when Tom Waits decides to go on the road, you get yourself to Cleveland.

Adulation of Tom Waits has been well-documented on this site on more than one occasion, so I won’t go on at length about his undeniably singular oeuvre. Let’s just say that I, like most if not all of the Some American writers, dig his work. I dig it considerably.

One of the more compelling reasons to go to a Waits show (of which there are many) is to see how he chooses to reinterpret, mangle and twist his songs; he has a knack for bending songs over backwards while still retaining their original thrust. On “Goin’ Out West”, one of many cuts culled from his near-20 year output for current home Anti- Records, he sounds less like a wild man burning through the desert at top speed (as on Bone Machine’s original version) and more like a suave drifter rolling through town in a monstrous Cadillac convertible. As well as swapping the original’s ragged howl for a low, raspy croon, Waits hams it up by adding an extra repetition of the lyric “I look good without a shirt” that sounds squeezed through the cheesiest of grins. “Such A Scream”, another tune pulled from Bone Machine, shows touring guitarist Omar Torres playing like he’s in the middle of a mid-70s James Brown funk workout. The rest of the band sticks to the original version’s ramshackle clatter-and-holler aesthetic, and for reasons beyond me the combination doesn’t suck.

“Such A Scream” also shows one of Waits’ greatest strengths as a touring musician: his ability to pick a backing band. His son Casey Waits’ off-kilter drumming on “Scream” doesn’t have a hint of a straightforward backbeat. Instead, Waits the younger leans on rolls, fills, and seemingly random hits dropped wherever in the bar he damn well pleases. I’m not sure what would be more impressive: having these parts meticulously laid-out in advance, or coming up with them on the spot without losing the plot entirely. Clearly there’s a gene marker for this sort of thing.

Another strength of Waits’ touring operation is his sound engineers. Since I missed out on the Glitter & Doom tour, I can’t attest to the quality of the sound at the shows, but what’s presented here is immaculately recorded; the most subtle hisses from the corner of Waits’ mouth are as prominent as the sound of his son’s cymbal hits clattering off the back wall of the venue. Even the crowds at these shows were well-mic’d: when they join in during the bridge of “Trampled Rose”, it sounds less like handclaps than boughs cracking, and nearly overwhelms Casey Waits’ snare hits. What’s particularly remarkable about the sound of the record is its cohesion; despite the fact that the album pulls from over a dozen performances on the U.S. and European legs of the tour, the songs sound like they could all be part of one set. That is, they could be were it not for the glaring lack of crowd banter. As those who have heard Waits’ previous live offerings or have been to any of his shows can attest, his non sequiturs and interactions with the audience are an essential part of the show. It’s puzzling, then, that on Glitter & Doom, none of this is included in the main set. Instead, we get “Tom Tales”, a 30-plus minute collage of snippets taken from various shows. Its rambling stories of uncharitable shellfish and ill-conceived ebay excursions are indeed classic Waits fare, but when presented in this format they begin to feel tiresome well before the halfway mark. As entertaining as his seemingly random comments may be, they fare better when used as interstitials in between songs.

I’ve read some other reviews of this album describing it as a crowd-pleaser for Waits fans, but ultimately unlikely to bring in any newcomers; if you didn’t like Waits before, you probably won’t like him now. I disagree completely - this may be my inner Waits fanboy talking, but if Glitter & Doom doesn’t convince you in the slightest of Waits’ staggering prowess, then perhaps, friendo, something is wrong with you.

Some American RECOMMENDS Tom Wait’s Glitter & Doom Live