Another from the VH-1 Storytellers THE MAESTRO | TOM WAITS 1999 | ALBUMS THAT SHOULD EXIST

Tom Waits - VH-1 Storytellers, Burbank Airport, Los Angeles, CA, 4-1-1999

Well Tom gets a plug all to himself this time of course but the series continues over at ATSE and Paul says: The "VH-1 Storytellers" flood continues with an episode featuring singer-songwriter Tom Waits.

"I have conflicted opinions about Waits. On one hand, I really don't like his voice, which I feel is part of a deliberately constructed persona where he's trying to be a character in a Charles Bukowski novel. But on the other hand, I can't deny he's a talented songwriter, and I enjoy his songs when other people sing them. Given that, I wasn't really looking forward to prepping this album. But it was better than I'd expected. A big part of that is there's a lot of banter, and his talking is entertaining without the singing vocals problem I have with him.

One nice thing about the Storytellers album is that the episodes were typically only about 45 minutes long, but a good portion of them are bootlegs that are a lot longer. This is one such case. The soundboard bootleg I found was nearly two hours long, but I cut out a little bit of dead air here and there. I also removed a song or two that were redone because the producers of the show weren't happy with the first version for some reason or another.

At the time of this concert, Waits was just about to release "Mule Variations," his first studio album in six years. It would come out two weeks later. Rolling Stone Magazine would later include it in their list of the top 500 albums of all time. A few songs were played from it: "Chocolate Jesus," "Get Behind the Mule," "Hold On," "Picture in a Frame," "House Where Nobody Lives," and "What's He Building." This is mostly performed in solo acoustic mode.” Paul at ATSE

01 talk 
02 Tango 'till They're Sore
03 talk 
04 Hang Down Your Head 
05 talk 
06 Ol' 55 
07 talk 
08 Strange Weather
09 talk 
10 Hold On [False Start] 
11 Hold On 
12 talk 
13 Picture in a Frame 
14 talk 
15 I Can't Wait to Get Off Work 
16 talk 
17 House Where Nobody Lives 
18 Get Behind the Mule Intro 
19 Get Behind the Mule 
20 talk 
21 Chocolate Jesus 
22 talk
23 What's He Building
24 talk 
25 A Little Rain
26 talk 
27 Downtown Train 
28 talk 
29 Black Wings 
30 talk 
31 Jesus Gonna Be Here
32 talk 
33 Jersey Girl