THE BEAT GOES ON
TOM WAITS: The Slime Who Came In From The Cold SAN FRANCISCO—A pointy, black shoe kicks the motel door open, and in lurches something even the cat would refuse to drag in. It’s Tom Waits, looking like a stubble-chinned stumble bum who just traded a pint of blood for a pint of muscatel down at the plasma center.
THE BEAT GOES ON
TOM WAITS: The Slime Who Came In From The Cold
SAN FRANCISCO—A pointy, black shoe kicks the motel door open, and in lurches something even the cat would refuse to drag in. It’s Tom Waits, looking like a stubble-chinned stumble bum who just traded a pint of blood for a pint of muscatel down at the plasma center. His attire—Frederick’s of Goodwill—is appropriately seedy on his meager frame.
“I’ve got an eagle tattooed on my chest,” he growls. “Only on this body it looks more like a robin.”
Now that he’s made Time magazine and has five albums out on Asylum (Foreign Affairs is the newest), Tom Waits is the cat’s meow (or is it the cat’s barf?). When he made his TV debut on Fern wood 2 Night, singing “The Piano Has Been Drinking” and then bantered with friend/host Martin Mull, Mull apologized for having only a Diet Pepsi to offer. Waits whipped out a flask from his coat and Mull made a comment about him “sitting here with a bottle in front of him.”