Review: Tom Waits - Bad As Me

38 years and 22 albums into his career - and Tom Waits just doesn't get old. Excuse the pun.

Bad As Me is US music man Tom Waits' 17th album proper.

Chicago: An up-tempo, rich track - you can almost see dancers high kicking to this song at a cabaret. It might not be as stunning as the openers on 1992's Bone Machine or 1987's Franks Wild Years, but it is a good track. Waits sings of abandoning all you know for the unknown: "The seeds are planted here but they won't grow/ ... Maybe things will be better in Chicago/ To leave all we've ever known for a place we've never seen". 

Raised Right Men: Classic Tom Waits. He wails to his trademark manic blues: "A good woman can make a diamond out of a measly lump of coal/ You need the patience of a glacier/ if you can wait that long". It's a gorgeous song and it's all about love, love, love – Waits style, of course. He's like Frank Sinatra in a dingy blues bar.

Talking at the Same Time: This is where he gets all moody and sensual. Waits puts away his Louis Armstrong voice and brings out his crooner pipes as he observes society: "Well it’s hard times for some/ for others it’s sweet/ someone makes money when there’s blood in the street". It's a morose song that’s not as heart-wrenching as Tom Traubert's Blues - but who said it has to be?

Get Lost: This is a gospel-laden, big-band track in the vein of Chocolate Jesus. The theme of chucking it all in and leaving crops up again ("I got my ride all souped up/ We’re never coming back again"). Tom Waits might be pushing 62, but he's no whiny old man.

Face to the Highway: Sound-wiseit's reminiscent of How's It Gonna End (from 2004's Real Gone). The lyrics are the quirky introspection typical of Waits: "The cradle wants a baby/ the kitchen wants a pan/ the heart wants a certain kind of lover if it can/... The walls of the prison want a solitary man". His Tom Traubert's Blues voice is back on, and it's beautiful.

Pay Me: A stunner. Waits sings the song of an exiled entertainer."They pay me not to come home," he sings."You know I gave it all up for the stage/ they fill my cup up in the cage", before plotting his escape: "The only way down from the gallows is to swing/ And I’ll wear boots instead of high heels/ and the next stage that I am on will have wheels".

Back in the Crowd: A beautiful heart-breaker about being in a relationship with someone whose heart isn't in it. Waits sings: "If you don't want these arms to hold you/ if you don't want these lips to kiss you/ if you found someone new/ Put me back in the crowd ". His tone here is defeated, lamenting being unloved and unwanted.

Bad As Me: Full of attitude and wit like the man himself. He sounds like a maniac as he compares two lovers: "You’re the head on the spear/ You’re the nail on the cross/ You’re the fly in my beer/ You’re the key that got lost/... I’m the blood on the floor/ The thunder and the roar/... You're the same kind of bad as me". It's an ode to a perfectly torrid love affair.

Kiss Me: Mr Waits brings out the romantic, which should hardly be surprising because he's been married to his wife and songwriting partner Kathleen Brennan for three decades and he speaks tenderly of her in interviews. He sings: "You wear the same kind of perfume you wore when we met/ I suppose there’s something comforting in knowing what to expect/ But when you brushed up against me/ Before I knew your name/ Everything was thrilling because nothing was the same". Ah, lovely!

Fun fact: Waits revealed that in order to get the crackly vinyl sound on the song, he put up a microphone against frying chicken.

Satisfied: Lyrically and sonically it's the most 'out-there' song on this album. It would fit comfortably with his more 'kooky' tracks, although I hate to admit, Waits is not as crazy as he's been in the past, when he was younger. "When I’m gone, roll my vertebrae out like dice/ Let my skull be a home for the mice," he sings.

Last Leaf: This one could be a metaphor for ageing and death, like his own version of Leonard Cohen's Tower of Song. But not as depressing, thankfully. "I'm the last leaf on the tree/ the autumn took all the rest but it won't take me/...  I greet all the new ones that are coming in green". Mortality must be something that one thinks about when all around you are dying. It's a good song, but it adds nothing to the album.

Hell Broke Luce: It's like hell storming into town with a marching band. It's one of the best moments on this album and it shows Waits going crazy in a way only he knows how. He explores war and its effects on soldiers, although it's more Apocalypse Now than Full Metal Jacket. Oh, and Waits throws around the F-bomb quite a bit.

New Year's Eve: And the album ends on a calmer note, almost as though Waits is soothing the listener after the scary ride that was Hell Broke Luce. Yet again, there’s nothing particularly outstanding about this track.

CONCLUSION: Bad As Me is as good as any other Tom Waits album. It's nothing overly experimental. It won't scare off newbies and it will satisfy old fans. He doesn't venture into any unchartered territory - and as a man who's done everything music-wise, what more can he do? But we're not holding that against him, because it's a solid album to add to his impressive discography.

RATING: 8/10