Covered in Folk: Tom Waits
(Dave Alvin, Kathryn Williams, Shawn Colvin, Sarah Jarosz, Redbird +more!)
December 26th, 2009 — 10:08 pm
I somehow managed to reach full-bore adulthood without hearing a lick of Tom Waits. Which is probably all for the better: as I’ve noted many times, my long-standing preference for melodic voices is only now giving way to a mature appreciation of the unique beauty that springs from powerful truths filtered through broken instruments.
And anyway, the Tom Waits songbook is eminently adult, both in the way it looks at the world through bleary, jaded, ancient eyes and the way it rattles about with themes of alcoholics, lonesome trainwatchers, tired prostitutes, and others past their prime, struggling to capture the last licks of a life that has almost finished passing them by. Indeed, the world that Waits inhabits often seems to burn with unfinished life-energy, the heat haze of a drunkard’s sweaty existence in every growl – sometimes festering, sometimes flickering, sometimes roaring out of control.
But there’s also something about a Tom Waits song that suits the stillness of winter. There’s ice in these bittersweet, boozy ballads: the chill of an outsider’s threadbare coat, the thin layer of frost that forms on a dying relationship, the icicle weight of the guillotine metaphor, an observer’s frozen distance from the ideal. In Waits’ capable hands, as in winter’s quietude, the world aches with wistfullness; time captured in crystal, the pessimistic inevitabilities of future and the hard roads of the past ever present in the hopeful moment.
Tom Waits is well-covered, and he should be. His melodies are simple, his imagery clear. The gaze of his narrators and the desires of his subjects resonate with us. The icewall that he places between the world as it is and the world longed for is a familiar one, for it represents our innermost fears and projections. And as long as they are treated tenderly, there are a multitude of ways to interpret these songs.
But where the songs of Bob Dylan and Richard Thompson are, by definition, folk songs, which lend themselves to a universal opportunity for coverage, Waits writes songs for his own distinctive voice. The coarse, gravelly vocals and slow piano-driven delivery that mark Waits’ beautifully broken performance wring every drop of poignancy from their underclass hearts and streets so exquisitely, it poses a particular challenge for would-be interpreters. And sure enough, as a bevy of mediocre, mixed-bag tribute albums proves, it’s surprisingly hard to cover a Tom Waits song with efficacy – to transform that rawness without shaming it with antiseptic beauty, or overwhelming it with rage and despair.
Too many miss the tenderness Waits feels for his subjects. Too many fall too quiet, focusing on melody to the detriment of the necessary nuance. Balance is key, here, lest the longing turn maudlin and cheap, or the chill turn to heat and anger.
Still, there are many ways to capture winter well. Ice can be fragile or fleeting, jagged or muddied, brittle or echoingly still; it can trap us, or shatter beneath us, or even sustain our careful footsteps across it, if we mind our surroundings. Here’s a few folksingers and singer-songwriters who manage to get it right.
- The Cottars: Hold On
(Barely-restrained Celtic folkpop, a thrillride from Nova Scotian sibling act The Cottars’ Forerunner) - Redbird: Hold On
(Sparse, touchingly ragged singer-songwriter fare with rotating lead and harmony vocals from Peter Mulvey, Jeffrey Foucault, and Kris Delmhorst, performing as folk collective Redbird.) - Kathryn Williams and Neill MacColl: Innocent When You Dream
(A lighthearted, slightly twee lo-fi lullaby waltz from UK singer-songwriters Kathryn Williams and Neill MacColl’s 2008 duet album Two.) - Anna Ternheim: Anywhere I Lay My Head
(Echoey demo-quality indiefolk from Swedish poprock singer-songwriter and indie darling Anna Ternheim. Off 2005 EP Shoreline.) - Heidi Talbott: Time
(Lovely, delicate Irish-American tradfolk from “carefully understated” Celtic singer-songwriter Heidi Talbott; from I Love + Light, featured here two summers ago.) - Emiliana Torrini: I Hope That I Don’t Fall In Love With You
(Broken-voiced pianofolk from Icelandic alt-pop singer Emiliana Torrini‘s 1996 import-only underground gem Merman.) - Arrica Rose: I Hope That I Don’t Fall…
(Whispery grungefolk from LA indie singer-songwriter Arrica Rose, whose 2008 release LA La Lost first gave us opportunity to rant about doing Tom Waits right – and wrong.) - Shawn Colvin: (Looking For) The Heart Of Saturday Night
(Sweet live coverfolk from Shawn Colvin, released just before her AAA popstar era; from fave 1994 Columbia Records release Cover Girl.) - Madeleine Peyroux: (Looking For) The Heart Of Saturday Night
(Sublime, shimmery Holiday-esque brushfolk from jazz/blues chanteuse Madeleine Peyroux, whose 2006 release Half The Perfect World lives eternally on my mellow playlist.) - Sarah Jarosz: Come On Up To The House
(Sparse acoustic jamgrass from Song Up In Her Head, this year’s debut from bluegrass wunderkind Sarah Jarosz, first featured here back in April.) - Mike and Ruthy: Long Way Home
(Softly strummed late-night americana-string-band music from married folk couple and ex-Mammals Mike and Ruthy‘s gorgeous post-wedding album The Honeymoon Agenda.) - Norah Jones: The Long Way Home
(Sultry bluesfolk from everyone’s favorite slippery-voiced popjazz chanteuse Norah Jones, whose new album ain’t bad, either.) - Holly Cole: I Don’t Wanna Grow Up
(Fragile jazzplay from perennial Tom Waits interpreter Holly Cole. Her tribute album Temptation is one of the great ones.) - Vamosbabe & Pascal Fricke: Bronx Lullaby
(Classical jazz guitar and quiet vocals from the second of three Waits cover albums by Pascal Fricke, aka Waitswatcher, a great Cover Me find.) - Botanica: Broken Bicycles
(Eerie, slightly melodramatic folk rock from Botanica, off the same New Coat of Paint tribute album as that everpresent Neko Case cover. Trust me, it grows on you.) - Clara Bakker: Temptation
(Live full-throated bluesfolk with just the right touch of tango from Dutch vocalist Clara Bakker.) - Dave Alvin: Blind Love
(Low-down and bluesy rootsfolk from alt-country progenitor Dave Alvin‘s high-production West of the West, a strong tribute to a diverse mix of his favorite California singer-songwriters.) - Hayes Carll: Bad Liver & A Broken Heart
(Broken-down troubadour folk from young alt-country blogdarling Hayes Carll, recorded live on Mountain Stage this past February. [UPDATE: Whoops! Seems this is a Scott Nolan cover, not the Tom Waits song by the same name. Mea culpa – but a great cover nonetheless!)
Tom Waits coverfolk previously on Cover Lay Down:
- Alt-country goddess Lucinda Williams covers Hang Down Your Head and a host of other fitting songs.
- Dan Hicks and his Hot Licks cover The Piano Has Been Drinking. Plus: more drunken coverfolk.
- Contradance band Popcorn Behavior covers The Briar and the Rose, one of a dozen rose songs for Valentines Day.