Wild Years: The Music and Myth of Tom Waits [Paperback]

Jay Jacobs (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 2000

Wild Years: The Music and Myth of Tom Waits retraces the long road that Waits has traveled and explores the music that made him a legend. Discussed is the towering myth that Waits has created for himself, a larger-than-life persona of neon bar lights and desperate dreams. Revealed is a complex, brilliant, and fascinating man comfortable portraying the role of off-beat music legend and yet resolutely protective of his private life.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Updated to include Tom Waits's most recent endeavors-albums Real Gone, Blood Money and Alice, and movies Coffee and Cigarettes and Domino-Jacobs's biography of the man with the gravely voice draws on a 30-year career, a lot of interviews and Waits's microphone banter to show "the irony of Tom Waits's career is that after he found happiness, love, and sobriety, his music became more and more experimental." Waits appears here with all the trappings of an iconic figure, including the self-mythologizing: Jacobs quotes Waits heavily, but warns that the musician's words are often of questionable accuracy. With over 30 images capturing Waits in his many different roles, a discography (including covers) and a list of Waits's guest appearances, Jacobs's biography will find a welcome audience in fans of Waits's music.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

From the Publisher

A look at the music and legend of Tom Waits, the poet laureate of the American night. Wild Years: The Music and Myth of Tom Waits retraces the long road that Waits has travelled and explores the music that made him a legend. Jay S. Jacobs looks at the towering myth that Waits has created for himself, a larger-than-life persona of neon bar lights and desperate dreams. It reveals a complex, brilliant, and fascinating man comfortable portraying the role of off-beat music legend and yet resolutely protective of his private life. Poet laureate of the common man, Waits is the lifeline between the great Beat poets and today's rock & roll heroes. He's old enough to be your dad and cool enough to be your hero. Waits is one of the few truly original musicians recording today. He's also the rare singer who can actually act, and he has put together a respectable body of work in movies. He's a modern Renaissance man. From his early years when he embraced the beatniks and the grimy realities of life on the streets, to more recent tonal experiments, Waits stubbornly followed his own path and vision. His 1999 album, Mule Variations, was the best selling of his thirty-year career.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 250 pages
• Publisher: ECW Press (October 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 155022414X
• ISBN-13: 978-1550224146
• Product Dimensions: 9.8 x 6.7 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,355,716 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I am the author of the books "Wild Years: The Music and Myth of Tom Waits" and "Pretty Good Years: A Biography of Tori Amos." I am also an editor and writer for the pop culture web magazine www.popentertainment.com. I have also written hundreds of articles for magazines such as Creem, CD Review, Rockpile, Concert News, Underground Press, New Review and many others. I have written liner notes for CD projects from Warner Brothers and Universal Records. I have also written four motion picture screenplays which have been ignored or rejected by some of the biggest names in Hollywood.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

97 of 97 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Examining the Music of a Private Man, February 26, 2002

By 

Susan Hickey "Singed Cat" (Atlanta GA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Wild Years: The Music and Myth of Tom Waits (Paperback)

Waits' fans are no strangers to paradox -- his music, steeped in its own history yet undeniably original, deeply textured as corrugated steel yet with a compassionate heart that doesn't quit, songs that reveal humanity's every weakness, and in doing so somehow redeem it. His music revels in its own originality without falling prey to self-indulgence.

So it shouldn't have surprised me that Tom Wait's biographies have been as badly written, speculative, and poorly directed as his music has been insightful and original. From his early years Waits portrayed the piano playing drunk, the street poet, the loser with dreams, and seemed to love using that voice to speak to the press. Interviewers were treated to long yarns about his life, loves and friends, yarns spun from a humorous imagination by a private man. Books trying to build on this paper foundation have fallen flat as last night's beer, and if some fans (and reporters) were annoyed by his evasions and stories, more were entertained by the them, and willingly accepted Waits as the character he portrayed, a seedy addition to American mythology.

Waits is not the first artist to use a stage persona as a privacy screen, but he was one of the most successful. It is my opinion that this avoidance was not so much a personal aversion to the limelight, but a desire to proect his music from himself. To that end, he only revealed the parts of himself that supported his music, and, like any good thespian, hid the machinery with the scenery.

Finally, someone got the point. Jay S. Jacobs writes about Waits from a thoughtful perspective unseen in previous biographers. Guiding us with a wink and a smile past the many myths and tall tales, Jacobs brings us backstage to the artist without knocking down his front door. Those looking for juicy details and scandalous stories will be disappointed-- the basics of his private life are related only in context of his musical career. Jacobs makes no attempt to analyse or interpret Waits' personality.

That being said, those looking for a portait of Waits the artist will be amply rewarded. The details of his career are recorded here as nowhere else; details of projects he's worked on, creative decisions and how they related to his goals and situation at the time, inspirations for songs both factual and fantastic, interviews with producers and musicians he has worked with broaden our view. Here too we see that the easygoing streetpoet is defended by an uncompromising artst who picks his fights carefully: his refusal to sell his music rights to sell products; his lawsuit against Frito Lay; his legal action against police officers who mistook him for someone they could abuse.

With each successive project, with each professional decision, we are given a block-by block construction of a remarkable career, which fell short (or steered clear?) of the commercial fast track in favour of a more winding road to a more unique, enduring and (I suspect) satisfying destiny.

I know that Waits himself does not approve of projects directed at his life; nevertheless as a musician I am deeply grateful to Jacobs for giving us biography. In the past I was moved and shaken by his music; now I am proud to count him as a role-model.

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Terrific bio on Tom!, January 23, 2001

By 

Louis Hirshorn (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Wild Years: The Music and Myth of Tom Waits (Paperback)

I've always kind of wondered what makes Tom Waits tick, and I think this very well written book gave me as good a view as I'm likely to get. It covers all the basics, the drinking, the family, the childhood, the dives, the music, the movies, etc. It also opens up the fact that Waits seems to be a surprisingly introspective man, who puts his art before anything else. If nothing else, the book is worth reading because the man is such an original thinker and wordsmith. "Wild Years" seems to capture that originality and truly appreciates the body of work that Waits has put together. This book helps to explain the subtle mystery that is Tom Waits.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very Informative Book, January 22, 2001

By 

Fred Hamilton (Chicago) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Wild Years: The Music and Myth of Tom Waits (Paperback)

Jacobs' has written an informative, interesting book about Tom Waits, one of my favorite artists. It reads like a who's who of creative geniuses as we trace Waits' life up to his current Epitaph recordings. The two best things about the book are the context it gives to each od his songs and the beautiful black and white photographs, which I wanted to cut out and paste to my apartment's walls. Obviously, the book no where near as breath-taking as Waits' music, but it's a great and rewarding accessory.