release date: Oct. 1976
format: cd
[album rate: 4,5 / 5] [4,32]
producer: Bones Howe
label: Asylum Records - nationality: USA
Track highlights: 1. "Tom Traubert's Blues (Four Sheets to the Wind in Copenhagen)" (5 / 5) - 2. "Step Right Up" - 3. "Jitterbug Boy (Sharing a Curbstone With Chuck E. Weiss, Robert Marchese, Paul Body and the Mug and Artie)" - 5. "The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me)" (4 / 5) - 7. "Pasties and a G-String (At the Two O'Clock Club)" (4 / 5) - 9. "The One That Got Away" - 11. "I Can't Wait to Get Off Work" (4 / 5)
4th studio album by Tom Waits following one year after his 'live' album Nighthawks at the Diner.
Opening the album with "Tom Traubert's Blues..." is also commonly known as "Waltzing Mathilda" - and as the unofficial Australian national anthem.
A lot has happened since his debut, and that only really is revealed on this, where his vocal has become a more original instrument, and which in a way marks a first distancing from his first three albums. Waits was pretty good on his first albums, but here he no longer sounds like another clone based on Bob Dylan or Tim Buckley - this is where the 'real' Waits really awakens.
I don't think the man made anything resembling a bad album during the 70s. His lyrics and music are almost constantly at a very high level.
Highest recommendation.
[ allmusic.com 4,5 / 5, Rolling Stone 4 / 5, Mojo 5 / 5 stars ]
