release date: Apr. 27, 1999
format: cd
[album rate: 4 / 5] [4,04]
producer: Tom Waits & Kathleen Brennan
label: ABTI- / Epitaph - nationality: USA
Track highlights: 1. "Big in Japan" - 2. "Lowside of the Road" - 3. "Hold On" (official video) (4 / 5) - 4. "Get Behind the Mule" - 5. "House Where Nobody Lives" - 6. "Cold Water" - 8. "What's He Building?" (official video) - 10. "Eyeball Kid" - 11. "Picture in a Frame" - 12. "Chocolate Jesus" (live) - 13. "Georgia Lee" - 14. "Filipino Box Spring Hog" - 15. "Take It With Me" - 16. "Come on Up to the House"
13th studio album by Tom Waits following a long 5½ years after The Black Rider (1993) is his first album of new material after leaving Island Records, on which label he had been on a contract since '83. Instead of trying to renew his contract with the established record company, he chose to sign a contract with the newly established and independent label, ANTI-. All sixteen tracks are credited Waits, twelve of which are co-written with his wife, Kathleen Brennan. The album is a rather long affair with a total running time of more than 70 minutes.
The album is simply a clear improvement over his '93 release, but as it has often been the case with Tom Waits, this one marks a musical shift. The '90s have been, if anything, his experimental decade, and sometimes it proved very successful, while at other times he hit a little off the mark, but he has always been an exponent of making music in surprising new ways, as with this one, where he chooses to record his voice via megaphone. Mule Variations is an album with elements from blues rock in a singer / songwriter context and compositions that may be called experimental in an art rock category, and some tracks are influenced by cabaret / circus music, but at the same time it's more laid back - like a collection of songs inspired by country rock and / or Americana, and this is probably where the really new elements come into the picture when talking about Waits.
The album would prove to be Tom Waits' most significant chart-topper ever on the Billboard 200 in his home country, peaking at number #30, and not only was it a success here as it went to number #22 in France, No. #13 in Australia, No. #9 in the UK, No. #4 in Germany, and then it simply topped the album chart in Norway. More honors followed when Mojo nominated it as "Album of the Year" and Waits himself was nominated in "Best Male Rock Vocal Performance" for the song "Hold On" at the '99 Grammy Awards, and Mule Variations won the award "Best Contemporary Folk Album" - his second award at the Grammy Awards.
The strength of the album lies very much in the supplementary lyrics, and these are not seldom the fascinating narratives created by Waits' wife, Kathleen Brennan. The album is quite complete and functions as a whole from an artist who knows how to renew himself and his music.
Highly recommended.
