Product Description
3CD Box
.co.uk
With these astounding 54 songs, Tom Waits has added a vital new work to his catalog. The title, Orphans, refers to the songs either being from a range of outside projects, various impulses, and whims, or simply not having found a place on the albums for which they were intended. While that scenario has constituted a stopgap measure for lesser artists, this set stands alongside Waits's finest work. He has shaped it into three separate discs, each one separately titled after the prevailing character of its tracks and playing with its own mood and dramatic arc. Brawlers favors raucousness and uptempo grinds and grooves, while Bawlers showcases balladry and the more overtly poetic. Bastards is a funhouse of angular characters, spiky anecdotes, shaggy dogs, and even a Kurt Weill cover. The set offers everything from the amped-up rockabilly hiccuping of "Lie to Me" to the breathtaking perfection of "Shiny Things," and from the outraged political reporting of "Road to Peace" to the closing-time lament of "Little Man." --David Greenberger
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Review
Pictured on the sleeve in daguerreotype sepia surrounded by the ghosts of America's alternative cultural history, Waits has now firmly sealed his place as one of the USA's major storytellers. Orphans, containing rarities, reworkings and new material, beautifully demonstrates how he uses just about every native musical form of expression to achieve this high standing. These aren't offcuts, but prime Tom.This box set is handily split into three themed parts: Brawlers being composed of mutant rockabilly jive suffused with the spirit of the Mississippi delta, Gene Vincent and all points in between; Bawlers is the softer side of Tom's muse, containing ballads and laments; meanwhile Bastards is the most intriguing set, filled with Brechtian cabaret, strange tales, jokes and the most disturbing version of 'Heigh Ho' (from Hal Willner's Disney project, Stay Awake) that you'll ever hear. Shot through with the grime of gutter life and the fairy dust of magical, violent realism, Waits and wife Kathleen Brennan's 'strange couplings' (as he puts it) seem sometimes madly anachronistic yet utterly relevant. This set even contains what could be termed as Tom's first 'protest song' in 'The Road To Peace'. So, something for every type of Tom Waits fan and easily up there with his best work. Essential. --Chris Jones Find more music at the BBC This link will take you off in a new window
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Reviews
4.6
All from verified purchases
B**E
a difficult one to review
not sure how to review this, as i would give it 5 stars for the sheer breadth of material on here, and yet i'd give it 3 stars because i find, divvied up into the three types of songs, that listening to it in order is strangely dull. the beauty of a tom waits album is that it changes your mood constantly; you'll have the most tender ballad you've ever heard, where you're on the verge of tears, and all of a sudden you're stomping along to some bloodcurdling blues yelling, and then it's time for a marimba solo. you never get to coast, you never know what's coming next. here, you do, because all the ballads are on one cd, all the stompers are on another, and the whole thing is basically what's happened, you're looking through a massive catalogue of waits stuff, you're not listening to an album. i wish this had been ordered differently, or something. i don't know what i wish, but i've jumped the rating up from 3 to 4 stars, because there's such good stuff on here. i just don't know why i find it more difficult than most waits albums to wade through
E**Y
A TRILOGY OF STYLES
I thought I'd get into it but it's one of Tom's 'Marmite' albums. I don't mean that you either love it or hate it. I mean that I love one of the discs and hate the other two. I ordered the C.D because it was cheaper than the download alone ( odd marketing ). You get three discs entitled 'Bastards', 'Bawlers' and 'Brawlers'. I only like 'Brawlers' for it's more Rocky-Blues meanderings ( is that the right description of the good man's style ?) and would prefer to forget the other two discs, especially 'Bawlers' which could be too maudlin even for a depressed bloodhound's tastes.Eamonn
W**9
Tom 3 ways!!!
Very good and 3sides of different tom waites perspectives fab 👌
L**S
Good sleazy Tom
Tom at his best
P**A
all good
all good
T**N
Excellent 👍
Excellent hour's of Waits
I**T
Four Stars
Good album
R**M
UP THERE WITH TOMS BEST!!!
Incredible...will delight all tom fans such a range of styles.i am a big tom fan and rate this up there with his best work.if you like good music....dont think twice...buy it!!!
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Pictured on the sleeve in daguerreotype sepia surrounded by the ghosts of America's alternative cultural history, Waits has now firmly sealed his place as one of the USA's major storytellers. Orphans, containing rarities, reworkings and new material, beautifully demonstrates how he uses just about every native musical form of expression to achieve this high standing. These aren't offcuts, but prime Tom.
This box set is handily split into three themed parts: Brawlers being composed of mutant rockabilly jive suffused with the spirit of the Mississippi delta, Gene Vincent and all points in between; Bawlers is the softer side of Tom's muse, containing ballads and laments; meanwhile Bastards is the most intriguing set, filled with Brechtian cabaret, strange tales, jokes and the most disturbing version of 'Heigh Ho' (from Hal Willner's Disney project, Stay Awake) that you'll ever hear.
Shot through with the grime of gutter life and the fairy dust of magical, violent realism, Waits and wife Kathleen Brennan's 'strange couplings' (as he puts it) seem sometimes madly anachronistic yet utterly relevant. This set even contains what could be termed as Tom's first 'protest song' in 'The Road To Peace'. So, something for every type of Tom Waits fan and easily up there with his best work. Essential. --Chris Jones
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