For the uninitiated, the Tom Waits catalogue can seem rather daunting. Not only is Tom blessed with a sometimes challenging voice, but his albums have seen the legendary singer songwriter’s style change over time. His earliest albums present him as the ultimate bar room balladeer with a relatively clean voice; over the course of the 70s, his delivery becomes more ragged, more obtuse even, despite the core style of the music remaining the same. Into the 80s, Tom began to channel Kurt Weill and his music became more interesting, more rhythmic, a world away from the man who gave us ‘Ol’ 55’. By the end of the 90s and beyond, Waits almost sounded like a man working within a universe of his own: fans were as likely to hear him shouting his way through something in German to a musical backdrop deserving of a pirate shanty as they were to hear him storytelling at the piano.

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