Blues And Ballads Flavor Tom Waits' Bad As Me

Bad As Me is the first album of all new material from Tom Waits in seven years and it is well worth the time spent. Waits tries on a myriad of hats, pulling styles from all parts of his forty year career for this music while following a path of blues and ballads.

"Chicago" has a rhythm track like a gyrating factory machine. It helps to accentuate the lyrics that appear to be about the great Southern migration from the farms to the more Northern factories. An interesting mix of banjo and saxophone achieves this. Rolling Stone Keith Richards provides those Chicago blues guitar riffs he's so good at. Waits employs one of his many voices, the one like he's guzzling gravel.

Another interesting mix of sounds, Indian tabla drums, played by Waits, and spiky electric organ, played by Augie Meyers (Sir Douglas Quintet, Texas Tornados, Bob Dylan), provides the main rhythm on "Raised Right Men." A Chicago blues shuffle played with these instruments is certainly odd but it works. The drums sound like industrial machinery or metal trashcan lids, a style that has become synonymous with Waits and, as of late, played by his son Casey. Waits is wailing and moaning urgently here. Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers plays bass but it is not distinguishable.

An undulating Eastern European gypsy rhythm meets the old west meets 1920s jazz on "Talking At The Same Time." Waits uses his falsetto here but think more delta bluesman Skip James and less Robert Plant. Meyers provides some bluesy piano. The guitar playing has a lonesome surf/country echo. "Face To The Highway" is similar but slower and doesn't stand out as much. The percussion stomps but softly. Clean, jazzy little guitar fills give a slight Steely Dan meets Chris Isaak feel in parts. Bells and a somber violin break add dirge elements.

"Get Lost" has that '50s rock n' roll thing going for it. Waits yelping vocals overlay a simple but solid rhythm backbone with some sax flourishes. A great, bright energetic guitar solo with bite is played by either longtime Waits axeman Marc Ribot or David Hidalgo (Los Lobos), who plays on almost every track.

"Back In The Crowd" is a romantic ballad with a Mexican feel. The acoustic guitar riffs and the waltz-like rhythm help to achieve this. Brush drums and electric guitar fills complete the song.

Two songs have an Italian ballad feel. "Pay Me" uses accordion, vibes and violin to get this. Waits uses his "real" voice. Some piano adds to a melancholy feel. "New Year's Eve" is a fitting bookend to the album. This is a story-song in the best Tom Waits tradition, recounting the tale of imperfect family and friends on an imperfect holiday fraught with disaster.

"Back In The Crowd" is a love ballad with a Mexican feel. Acoustic guitar plucking and a waltz-like rhythm help to achieve this. Brush drumming and occasional electric guitar fills complete the song.

The title track, "Bad As Me" definitely seems like one that a record company would put out as promotion. Waits is being the quintessential howling madman that people expect him to be. His vocals invoke Screamin' Jay Hawkins' here. The instruments, jagged guitar, undulating sax and piston drumming, sort of roll off each other in waves. Chicago by way of Mississippi blues harmonica player Charlie Musselwhite gets a solo.

"Kiss Me" has an appealingly sparse arrangement. The upright bass, piano and vocals structure invokes the smoky after hours jazz club and coffee house feel of Waits' early '70s music. "Last Leaf" is similar but feels like a song friends would sing together after having had a few at a dark Irish pub. Lyrically, it has an obvious but appealing metaphor about staying true to who you are. Keith Richards provides slightly ragged but earthy background vocals.

On "Satisfied" Waits channels his inner Howlin' Wolf and once again, Richards brings the blues. Les Claypool (Primus) plays bass on this song but like with Flea on "Raised Right Men" you can't really hear it.

In the beginning it might appear as if Waits is attempting to rap on "Hell Broke Luce" but its nothing so pedestrian. This song imitates the "left, left, left, right, left" military march. Lyrically the song is about how war is hell and for many soldiers, the hell is carried with them when they come home. This song has a hammering rhythm and blues guitar fills.

Tom Waits has always made music about the seedier side of life, the ne'er-do-wells, the misfits, and the scalawags and thankfully that hasn't changed on Bad As Me. Even his love songs aren't maudlin. In the world of a Tom Waits song, you can't know happiness if you haven't first experienced sorrow first. The only downside to this album is that at times the tracks vary too wildly so a cohesion is lost.

His cigarette and alcohol flavored voice is also in fine form. Unlike some other gravely-voiced singers, Waits clearly recognizes that his is an instrument unto itself and has taken care to cultivate it as such as opposed to fighting it. He has also never been a flavor of the month type of musician. Fleeting trends do not enter his equation. He is a genre unto himself, which is why his records continue to be significant achievements amidst a cookie cutter landscape.