Living vicariously through Tom Waits’ Glitter and Doom Live
My new year’s resolution in 2024 was to see more live music.
That’s an evergreen goal for me as someone who’s literally made life decisions about how far to live from the nearest venue, and that’s only partially an exaggeration. But the stuck-in-place malaise of the 2020-2021 Covid pandemic served as a reminder that, however easier it is to simply become permanently affixed to your furniture, it doesn’t make me happier. In my record year of seeing shows (2014), I went to something on the order of 85-90 different events in a calendar year. That was a decade ago, and my body’s a little worse for the wear. Still, the closer I get to that goal, the better. (I’ve been keeping track, however sloppily, on Treble’s Patreon.)
But the thing with being a little older is that you sometimes have to be a little more selective about the shows you go to. Personal and professional commitments make the likelihood of me going out to see a band I’m only mildly interested in on a Tuesday night, for instance, pretty unlikely. Which in turn creates a sort of unwritten hierarchy of talent that determines whether or not I put it on the calendar, buy tickets in advance, or just show up if I’m feeling it.
This hierarchy is loosely organized into a couple of different tiers. At the bottom are the bands you see when you mostly just want to leave the house and have a beer, then next up are the bands you see when it’s convenient, and then the bands that you see whenever they come to town, but you wouldn’t necessarily rearrange plans for them. At the top, of course, are the Must-Sees. Some of them are the artists you go out of your way to see, like when I went to Washington, D.C. midweek to catch PJ Harvey on her I Inside the Old Year Dying tour (totally worth it). And some of them are just the bands that are on your never-miss list, like when Thou played here in Richmond that same week (also amazing).
But there’s a tier higher than that, and it’s the bands you’d go to the ends of the earth to see—if they tour. And that’s a big if—sometimes it never happens. For a couple decades I had a running list of bands I hoped would reunite but never expected to, but many of them have: Jawbox and Unwound for instance, each of whom eventually did and made my year when I saw them. But there’s always that one artist you hope to see, no matter how unlikely it might seem, no matter how infrequently they walk onstage. And for me, that’s Tom Waits.
The last time Tom Waits toured was over 15 years ago. It’s probably not so hard to believe that a troubadour with an outsize personality and mythical persona like that of Waits doesn’t actually do many public appearances. That wasn’t true when he launched his career in the ’70s, when he’d perform regularly in Southern California and hadn’t yet evolved into his Howlin’ Wolf-meets-Beefheart sound we now know today. And up through the late ’00s, he embarked on several tours behind records such as Real Gone and his outtakes triple-album Orphans, though not always in big cities or the expected places. On his 2008 tour of the U.S., for instance, he avoided both New York City and Los Angeles (and Chicago and Seattle and so on). At the time I would have easily traveled to Phoenix to see him perform, were I able to afford it (and if I was able to get the tickets on time, which even—in a pre-surge-pricing era—was a little tricky). Needless to say, it didn’t work out.
Since then, no tour. Tom Waits has occasionally emerged from his reclusive life in Sonoma County, California (which seems considerably less stressful than constant touring—so good for him!) to make appearances at a Hal Willner tribute, a Chuck E. Weiss tribute, late night shows and the Bridge School Benefit. And given that entire years have gone by in between, it seems unlikely that he’s planning on changing course anytime soon, and at 74 years old, it’s probably not getting any easier. But at least we have Glitter & Doom Live.
The most recent (so far) of only a handful of live albums in Tom Waits’ catalog, 2009’s Glitter & Doom Live captures a series of standout moments from his 2008 tour, recorded in cities as disparate as Edinburgh, Jacksonville, Tulsa and Milan. It leans heavy on his then-recent Real Gone, with standout back-catalog moments plucked from masterpieces such as Rain Dogs and Mule Variations. And it’s a phenomenal document that show exactly what I’ve been missing.
Kicking off with a back-and-forth medley of “Lucinda” and “Ain’t Goin’ Down to the Well,” Waits opens the ceremonies with top-notch showmanship, the kind of unpredictability and reinvention that makes a great live show—particularly one you probably traveled a good number of miles to see—worth it. Waits’ voice is an even deeper and more raucous growl than on record, his instrument having been honed of years evolving into the character of Tom Waits that we hear here. When the crowd erupts in applause between each transition, it’s earned.
The selection of songs leans away from the hits in favor of (mostly) deep cuts that allow Waits and his band of ringers to wring the most impact and groove out of each melody. “Get Behind the Mule” is set alight with gospel fervor and whipcrack percussion, while “Make It Rain” has a heavier blues rock approach, thick with organ and horns. And “Goin’ Out West” is Waits and his band at their bluesy and dirty, not to mention a fitting showcase for his hammy onstage presence, following every “I look good without a shirt…” with a winking “…he looks good without a shirt.” As Anti- Records has beefed up Waits’ online presence while reissuing much of his back catalog, the label has also provided a companion live visual on YouTube, to enhance the experience, offering listeners the opportunity to see the legend himself—his character too big for any staging to compete with (though the junkyard sculpture behind him is a fitting stage prop).
There is another element of Glitter & Doom that makes it indispensable: Tom Tales, a 35-minute companion disc of commentary, often backed by some flourishes of piano. Waits is known for being a charmingly unreliable raconteur, often sprinkling “facts” into interviews and obfuscating his own personal backstory, and he likewise filters that into his own songwriting, as on eerie spoken-word standouts like “What’s He Building?” Tom Tales is, simply, Waits bullshitting on stage, much like the novelty Having Fun With Elvis On Stage record, but much more entertaining. Throughout he spins strange and probably false yarns about rats and vultures, or feeling something moving in his stomach after swallowing pond water and discovering three toads in his stomach, or that the closest thing to the structure of moon rocks is actually provolone cheese. There’s even an implicit acknowledgement of his bullshit by ending a story about Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin with a “…because I know them. So there,” to uproarious laughter.
After a half-hour, Waits’ onstage gabfest wraps up with an unlisted, husky-voiced but still beautiful “Picture in a Frame,” placed conspicuously as if it were an encore. It’s the kind of thing you hear and think to yourself, “damn, I wish I had been there.”
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Jeff Terich is the founder and editor of Treble. He's been writing about music for 20 years and has been published at American Songwriter, Bandcamp Daily, Reverb, Spin, Stereogum, uDiscoverMusic, VinylMePlease and some others that he's forgetting right now. He's still not tired of it.