#399 - Tom Waits - Rain Dogs (1985)

MUSIC HISTORY WRITTEN BY HEAD WRITER DJ MORTY COYLE:

Released on September 30th of 1985 on Island Records, this is the self-produced ninth studio album by the American singer-songwriter/multi-instrumentalist.

I talked about most of Tom’s early bio on a previous episode so let’s just catch up and get to this album.

Born in Pomona, California in 1949 Tom began hitting the San Diego folk music circuit as a teen in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s before moving to Los Angeles in ’72 to be a songwriter.

With an ear for Jazz and an eye on contributing to the American standards songbook he was a sensitive and thoughtful balladeer with the persona of a wise-cracking, Beat poet.

In L.A. he signed with David Geffen’s and Elliot Robert’s Asylum Records and proceeded to have little critical and no commercial success with his first album, “Closing Time” until the Eagles recorded that album’s, “Ol’ 55.”

He made 6 more albums with varying degrees of underground and mainstream success for Asylum while building his critical and cult following.

He toured a lot, acted in films, and had romantic and musical relationships with Bette Midler and Rickie Lee Jones before meeting his future wife, collaborator, manager, and muse, Kathleen Brennan in 1979 and marrying the following year.

She turned him on to more avant-garde and experimental musicians like Captain Beefheart and Harry Partch which heavily influenced his next career direction as he moved to Island Records.

That reinvention which included a lot of the eclectic styles, sounds, and Tom’s expressively raspy vocals that are now synonymous with his next period were first displayed on 1983’s “Swordfishtrombones” which was a critical success.

It was also the beginning of his continuing self-producing.

In 1984, following that success Tom moved to New York and found a basement, boiler room, rehearsal space in lower Manhattan for two months to write his next album. The songs would be a fusion of Rock, Blues, Jazz, and more Experimental excursions that were inhabited by the dark and compelling characters he saw out his window and around town who were living life stories of the urban dispossessed.

This became the second record of a trilogy that began with “Swordfishtrombones” and concluded with 1987’s “Frank’s Wild Years.”

While not as focused or surprising as the previous album, “Rain Dogs” utilized many similar recording techniques and sounds like accordions, marimbas, horns, and various traditional and innovative percussion instruments.

To begin Tom would first show and arrange each song with his bassist since 1980 until today, Larry Taylor, who had previously played with The Monkees and Canned Heat.

And besides some special musical guests like Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones and G.E. Smith he added the unique, lead, guitar stylings of Marc Ribot and the trained, avant-garde percussionist Michael Blair who would both fulfill Waits’ vision for a “junkyard orchestra.”

With 19 songs on a single record and running almost an hour it might have benefitted from some editing but it was still mostly well-received.

Despite only reaching #188 on the U.S. chart and #29 on the U.K. chart it was the N.M.E.’s 1985 album of the year.

It’s considered one of Tom’s most popular albums if not the most.

With this and every album since he’s further cemented his reputation as one of the most successful and relevant cult artists ever.