release date: Oct. 1978
format: cd (1990 reissue)
[album rate: 4 / 5] [4,06]
producer: Bones Howe
label: Elektra Records - nationality: USA
Track highlights: 1. "Somewhere (from 'West Side Story')" - 2. "Red Shoes by the Drugstore" - 3. "Christmas Card From a Hooker in Minneapolis" - 4. "Romeo Is Bleeding" (live) - 5. "$29.00" - 6. "Wrong Side of the Road" - 8. "Kentucky Avenue" - 10. "Blue Valentines"
6th studio album by Tom Waits following Foreign Affairs (1977) with the almost constant of one year in between releases and for the fifth time with Bones Howe in the producer seat.
Blue Valentine is one of his best known and at the same time one of his most celebrated albums from the 70s, and for a reason. On his previous albums, he was always this fixated persona as a kind of a drunken homeless sitting at the piano, and the arrangements were all jazz-oriented with the piano at the centre of the songs. On this, it's still vocal jazz, blues and singer / songwriter material, but it's the first time you encounter electric guitar on a Waits album - and he plays it himself. On the opening track, Waits is heard singing two roles: his usual deep, hoarse and rusty voice and then a brighter singing voice in response. The change lies in both form and content, with more focus on ballads with string-and-horn arrangements (not really chamber pop) in jazzy versions. On the content side, he has kind of left behind his heartbreak songs, always evaporating a special Bukowski / Kerouac vibe from the 50s and early 60s, and instead there is focus on a more contemporary everyday street life, and the general feeling is to meet a more dramatic songwriter and composer.
Waits and Bette Midler were never really an official couple, although they were often seen together from 1976 to '77, but in the spring / early summer of '77 he met his 'soul-mate' in a then young and unknown Rickie Lee Jones, who hung out at Waits' old venue, The Troubadour on the outskirts of Los Angeles. She may be thought of as the one he sings about in songs #2 and #4, while Waits and his chambermaid Chuck Weiss ["Chuck E's in Love"] on the other hand, are believed to be her source of inspiration for her acclaimed debut Rickie Lee Jones (Feb. 1979). During the spring and summer of '79, Waits and Rickie Lee were still dating, but their unhealthy lifestyles of drugs and alcohol took their toll, and Jones may have become heavily addicted to string substance abuse during this period, which ultimately led to Waits quitting their relationship in the Fall of '79.
It's quite difficult to pinpoint selected songs as this is an album with no weak tracks on it, and it's somewhat of a landmark in Waits' career after witnessing the new musical winds with the influx of new wave and punk rock, which involved a changed view of the music industry.
Blue Valentine is a great place to start if you're unfamiliar with this great modern musician.
[ allmusic.com, Classic Rock 3,5 / 5, Uncut 4 / 5, Record Mirror 4,5 / 5, Mojo 5 / 5 stars ]
