Ye Ol' Badasses: Waits and Cash

I've been listening to some Tom Waits and Johnny Cash recently on account of knowing others who have similar tastes in music to myself that are fans of both. I'm starting to see why they're so popular. But I'm curious about what particular albums I should consider buying first from these two.

For one thing I like a lot of more melancholy or dark music. Any good albums from these two that fit mostly into these categories?

Not that I'd restrict myself to melancholy and darkness, of course.

TW's Alice
JC's latest

Tom Waits' Small Change is an amazingamazing album... yes. The Heart Of Saturday Night is also amazing. Rain Dogs is also awesome.

actually, don't ask me. I'm sort of obsessed with Everything That Is Tom Waits.

Get The Black Rider by Tom Waits. SO amazing. It's like being in a dreamy, freaky carnival.

I'm partial to Tom Waits' earlier stuff, but really you can't go wrong with any of it.
Same with Johnny, I love his old Sun Studios stuff.

Thanks for the suggestions guys.

I should've known that a lot of people would like so many of either one's albums that I wouldn't get a real consensus on what are the "best" albums. Too hard to choose, eh?

Which albums do you guys listen to most often?

tom waits did one of the tracks on the new ramones tribute album it's good.

I too am a Tom Waits nut.
My favorite early album of his is "Nighthawks At The Diner" - a live album.
To listen to it today, you'd never know it is nearly 30 years old. It is so timeless. His voice has a more smooth quality before cigarettes and alcohol completely ravaged it.
As far as later era stuff goes, I like "Bone Machine" and "Mule Variations" alot.
His voice is raspy and the music more dark.
As others have mentioned, you really can't go wrong with anything. Tom Waits does not put out bad albums - even the soundtrack for "One From the Heart" (with Crystal Gayle!?) has its moments.
Happy listening!

Waits - Swordfishtrombones. Black Rider.

Cash - I'm ignorant of Johnny. But like everyone else here, I think the "Hurt" video/song are great.

it really depends with both of them
Tom Waits' early stuff is way different from his more recent stuff, and its all kind of preference
i like it all personally
and with Johnny Cash is the same way, only not quite as drastic

hmmm... i'm not really into waits, but that 2 CD set of the "essential" johnny cash is pretty damn good.

also, there is a 3 CD set titled love, god, and murder, with each CD having songs about love, god, and murder, respectively.

my favorite is murder, especially for new orleans parish prison.

-bobby

buy johnny's live albums: folsom prison and san quentin. my favorite of the american recordings is unchained, but really, they're all good. there is some older stuff you should probably stay away from (i am definitely NOT referring to his early SUN stuff. those recordings are great). a lot of his "jesus jams" get a little tiresome. but there's just so much good stuff that it's hard not to score on just about every album.

For a "Best Of" Tom Waits, you can't go wrong with Used Songs. It's the best of his earlier stuff. Beautiful Maladies is a best of older stuff. I would have to go with Rain Dogs being my favorite album, but they all have something different to offer, so I'd recommend getting one of the compilations and then you can buy the CD's that have your favorites on there, and keep going.....

And Johnny Cash can do no wrong, but I would agree with the Love God Murder suggestion.

The Johnny Cash video for his cover of NIN's Hurt makes me really bummed. The toll and inescapability of age is so stark in the footage I found mysef thinking it wasn't fair and this guy should never die

-I know its dumb

For Waits I'm going to go with Rain Dogs. I have a feeling that I'm going to prefer a full album, rather than a compilation, and from the sounds of it that must be a solid choice. I'll probably download some of his earlier work to get more of a feeling for what I like of that.

For Cash I've yet to decide between the San Quentin recordings and "American Recordings". I presume San Quentin has a lot more original Johnny Cash songs, but, on the other hand, I do recognize several songs from American Recordings that I definitely like.

Thanks again for the suggestions.

Tom Waits - Closing Time
Johnny Cash - Live from Folsom Prison

and hey, how come niether those guys ever did a song about drinking, doing drugs, fighting or fucking?

[Edited on Mar 04, 2003 by Cash]

Anyone else hear the Tom Waits/Peter Murphy duo "Christmas Sucks". Love it. What a gem!

...the bottle is empty....
...the sleigh has a flat...
...the stripper in my bed is ugly and fat...
...her tassles are tangled and what's worse...
...my jingle won't jangle......

...all this good cheer is a pain in the nuts.....

...this holiday season is all the more reason to die...

Not too familiar with Johnny Cash, leave that for the ol daddy-o but I heard him do a cover of Nine Inch Nails 'Hurt' which was... so bizarre- he covers a lot of really unexpected stuff, so he has to be cool, along with having a voice like gravel

As for Tom Waits, I'm with anyone who listed Nighthawks At The Diner- That's a great mood-piece for me, that and Heart Of saturday Night...

It is going to be varied with the Tom Waits, his fans always argue over which album is best.
Mine would be Bone Machine, but also I enjoyed Blood Money a great deal. To enjoy his character, try and find Big Time.
With Cash, everything is good, but I am not too partial to his born again christian renewal stuff he did. Check out any of the albums he did since turning to American Records and also Live at Folsm Prison.
Cheers.

I can't believe I'm four days late to a Tom Waits thread. . .

Don't know if you've already made your choice, but you can't go wrong with Small Change or Rain Dogs. These are his most classic, quintessential ones for me. Heart of Saturday Night is quite an underrated little album but some people just don't care for his early, folksy songs. If you can track down one of his bootlegged live albums like Euro Visions, you can get yourself an intriguing peek into one of his live shows.

If after all this you're hooked on the man, next step is watching Big Time, Down By Law, Short Cuts and Fishing With John.

As others have said, get Johnny's Live from Folsom Prison and San Quentin albums - but if you're looking for cover stuff, I think American III is much better than his latest one.