movies for the ears iii

Tom Waits has made a career out of doing precisely the wrong thing. While the Beatles invaded America, he attempted to get a job as a Sinatra-style crooner at a San Diego golf club. As San Francisco turned psychedelic, he travelled to Haight-Ashbury with the intention of becoming not a hippy, but a be-bop-fuelled beatnik. When the US became dominated by the 70s west coast sound - cocaine-numbed faux-country about takin' it easy - Waits was to be found growling mournful piano ballads in which drunken low-lifes without a dime in their pockets cursed their luck while staring at the hookers through the neon-lit diner window (...)

(Alexis Petridis no The Guardian)