Tom Waits

[fox69]

"The Black Rider"

"The Black Rider"


Come on a long with the Black Rider
We'll have a gay old time
Lay down in the web of the black spider
I'll drink your blood like wine

So come on in
It ain't no sin
Take off your skin
And dance around your bones

So come along with the Black Rider
We'll have a gay old time

Anchors away with the Black Rider
I'll drink your blood like wine
I'll drop you off in Harlem with the Black Rider
Out where the bullets shine

And when you're done
You cock your gun
The blood will run
Like ribbons in your hair

So come along wit hthe Black Rider
We'll have a gay old time

Come on along with the Black Rider
I've got just the thing for thee
Come on along with the Black Rider
I want your company

I'll have the veal
A lovely meal
That's how I feel
May I use your skull for a bowl

Come on along with the Black Rider
We'll have a gay old time

 

[fox69]

"The Briar And The Rose"

"The Briar And The Rose"


I fell asleep down by the stream
And there I had the strangest dream
And down by Brennan's Glenn there grows
A briar and a rose

There's a tree in the forest
But I don't know where
I built a nest out of your hair
And climbing up into the air
A briar and a rose

I don't know how long it has been
But I was born in Brennan's Glenn
And near the end of spring there grows
A briar and a rose

P icked the rose one early morn
I pricked my finger on a thorn
It had grown so high
It's winding wove the briar around the rose

I tried to tear them both apart
I felt a bullet in my heart
And all dressed up in springs and clothes
The briar and the rose

And when I'm buried in my grave
Tell me so I will know
Your tears will fall
To make love grow
The briar and the rose

 

[fox69]

"The Fall Of Troy"

"The Fall Of Troy"


It's the same with men as with horses and dogs
Nothing wants to die
Evelyn James they killed in a game
With guns too big for their hands
Just off St. Charles in No-Mans Land
And you'll have to find your own way home, boys
You'll have to find your own way home

The oldest was Troy, an eighteen year-old boy
Shot dead in March with a robbery
His brother started out to hell and to ruin
Troy's killer was never caught they say
Young nick he just went bad that day
Now he'll have to find his own way home, boys
He'll have to find his own way home

Why cook dinner?
Why make my bed?
Why come home at all?
Out the door and through the woods
There is a world where nothing grows

It's hard to say grace and to sit in the place
Of someone missing at the table
Mom's hair sprayed tight
And her face in her hands
Watching TV for answers to me
After all she's only human
And she's trying to find her own way home, boys
She's trying to find her own way home

My legs ache
My heart is sore
The well is full of pennies

 

[fox69]

"The Ghosts Of Saturday Night (After Hours At Napoleone's Pizza House)"

"The Ghosts Of Saturday Night (After Hours At Napoleone's Pizza House)"


A cab combs the snake,
Tryin' to rake in that last night's fare,
And a solitary sailor
Who spends the facts of his life like small change on strangers...

Paws his inside P-coat pocket for a welcome twenty-five cents,
And the last bent butt from a package of Kents,
As he dreams of a waitress with Maxwell House eyes
And marmalade thighs with scrambled yellow hair.

Her rhinestone-studded moniker says, "Irene"
As she wipes the wisps of dishwater blonde from her eyes
And the Texaco beacon burns on,
The steel-belted attendant with a 'Ring and Valve Special'...
Cryin' "Fill'er up and check that oil"
"You know it could be a distributor and it could be a coil."

The early mornin' final edition's on the stands,
And that town cryer's cryin' there with nickels in his hands.
Pigs in a blanket sixty-nine cents,
Eggs - roll 'em over and a package of Kents,
Adam and Eve on a log, you can sink 'em damn straight,
Hash browns, hash browns, you know I can't be late.

And the early dawn cracks out a carpet of diamond
Across a cash crop car lot filled with twilight Coupe Devilles,
Leaving the town in a-keeping
Of the one who is sweeping
Up the ghost of Saturday night...

 

[fox69]

"The Last Rose Of Summer"

"The Last Rose Of Summer"


I love the way
The tattered clouds
Go wind across the sky

As summer goes
And leave me
With a tear in my eye

I'm taking out my winter clothes
My garden knows what's wrong
The petals of my favorite rose
Be in the shadows dark and long

Through every year
It's very clear
I should be used
To carrying on
But I can't be found
IN the garden
Singing this song

When the last
Rose of summer is gone

 

[fox69]

"The Ocean Doesn't Want Me"

"The Ocean Doesn't Want Me"


The ocean doesn't want me today
But I'll be back tomorrow to play
And the stranglers will take me
Down deep in their brine
The mischievous braingels
Down into the endless blue wine
I'll open my head and let out
All of my time
I'd love to go drowning
And to stay and to stay
But the ocean doesn't want me today
I'll go in up to here
It can't possibly hurt
All they will find is my beer
And my shirt
A rip tide is raging
And the life guard is away
But the ocean doesn't want me today
The ocean doesn't want me today

 

[fox69]

"The One That Got Away"

"The One That Got Away"


Well this gigolo's jumping salty, ain't no trade out on the streets,
Half past the unlucky, and the hawk's a front-row seat
Dressed in full orchestration, stage-door Johnny's got to pay,
And sent him home talking 'bout the one that got away

Could have been on Easy Street, could have been a wheel,
With irons in the fire and all them business deals
But the last of the big-time losers shouted before he drove away,
"I'll be right back, as soon as I crack the one that got away"

Well, the ambulance drivers, they don't give a shit,
They just want to get off work, and
The short stop and the victim are already gone berserk
And the shroud-tailor measures him for a deep-six holiday,
The stiff is froze, the case is closed on the one that got away

Now Jim Crow's directing traffic with them cemetery blues,
With them peculiar-looking trousers, them old Italian shoes
And a wooden kimono that was all ready to drop in San Francisco Bay
But he's mumbling something all about the one that got away

And Costello was the champion at the St. Moritz Hotel,
And the best this side of Fairfax, reliable sources tell
But his reputation is at large, and he's at Ben Frank's every day,
Waiting for the one that got away

He got a snakeskin sportshirt, and he looks like Vincent Price,
With a little piece of chicken, and he's carving off a slice
Someone tipped her off, and she'll be doing a Houdini now any day
She shook his hustle, and a Greyhound bus'll take the one that got away

Well, Andre's at the piano behind the Ivar in the sewers,
With a buck a shot for pop tunes, and a fin for guided tours
He could-a been in "Casa Blanca", he stood in line out there all day
Now he's spilling whiskey and learning songs about a one that got away

Well I've lost my equilibrium and my car keys and my pride,
The tattoo parlor's warm, and so I hustle there inside
And the grinding off the buzz-saw, "What you want that thing to say?"
I says, "Just don't misspell her name, buddy, she's the one that got away"

 

[fox69]

"The Part You Throw Away"

"The Part You Throw Away"


You dance real slow
You wreck it down
You walk away, then you
Turn around

What did that old blonde
Gal say?
That is the part...
You throw away

I want that beggars eyes
A winning horse
A tidy Mexican divorce

St. Mary's prayers
Houdini's Hands
And a Barman who always
Understands

Will you loose the flowers
Hold on to the vase
Will you wipe all those teardrops
Away from your fase
I can't help thinking
As I close the door
I have done all of this
Many times before

The bone must go
The wish can stay
The kiss don't know
What the lips will say

Forget I've hurt you
Put stones in your bed
And remember to never
Mind instead

Well all of your letters
Burned up in the fire
Time is just memory
Mixed in with Desire
That's not the road it is
Only the map...I say
Gone just like matches
From a closed down cabaret
In a Portuguese Saloon
A fly is a circling around
The room
You'll soon forget the
Tune that you play
For that is the part
You throw away
Ah, that is the part
You throw away

 

[fox69]

"The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me)"

"The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me)"


The piano has been drinking, my necktie is asleep
And the combo went back to New York, the jukebox has to take a leak
And the carpet needs a haircut, and the spotlight looks like a prison break
And the telephone's out of cigarettes, and the balcony is on the make
And the piano has been drinking, the piano has been drinking...

And the menus are all freezing, and the light man's blind in one eye
And he can't see out of the other
And the piano-tuner's got a hearing aid, and he showed up with his mother
And the piano has been drinking, the piano has been drinking
As the bouncer is a Sumo wrestler cream-puff casper milktoast
And the owner is a mental midget with the I.Q. of a fence post
'Cause the piano has been drinking, the piano has been drinking...

And you can't find your waitress with a Geiger counter
And she hates you and your friends and you just can't get served without her
And the box-office is drooling, and the bar stools are on fire
And the newspapers were fooling, and the ash-trays have retired
'Cause the piano has been drinking, the piano has been drinking
The piano has been drinking, not me, not me, not me, not me, not me

 

[fox69]

"The Pontiac"

"The Pontiac"


Well let's see, we had the eh, we had the Fairlane.
Then the u-joints went out on that and the bushings and then your mother wanted to trade it in on the Tornado, so we got the Tornado.
God, I hated the color of that son of a bitch.
And the dog destroyed the upholstery on the Ford.
Boy, that was long before you were born.
We called it the Yellowbird, two-door, three on the tree.
Tight little mother.
Threw a rod, sold it to Jacobs for a hundred dollar.

Now the Special eh, four-holer, you've never seen body panels lining up like that.
Overhead cam, dual exhaust.
You know I had, let's see I had, four Buicks, loved them all.

Now your Uncle Emmet, well he drives a Thunderbird, it used to belong to your Aunt Evelyn.
Now, she ruined it, drove it to Indiana with no gear oil.
That was the end of that!
Sold that Cadillac to your mom.
Your mom loved that Caddy.
Independent rear suspension,
Landau top, good tires.
Gas hog.
I swear it had the power to repair itself.

I love the old, Dan Steele used to give 'em to me at a discount.
Showroom models and that.
And then there was the Pontiac and...
God, I loved that Pontiac.
Well, it was kind of an ox-blood.
It just kinda handled so beautifully.
Yeah, I miss that car. Well, it was a long time ago, a long time ago.