I' m a relatively new fan of his considering the fact that I' ve been listening to his stuff for only about a year (much more lately) and he' s like 57 now. I usually don' t buy cds as I don' t have a decent music music store in my town, so I just download individual songs using Limewire. That being said most of what I' ve listened to of his is his later stuff. Actually in the past few months Tom waits has replaced my Rammstein obsession and I' ll be sure to buy as many of his CDs whenever I find any.
However the one I do have (Real Gone) is fantastic. So if you want buy to a Tom Waits CD, you can' t go wrong with " Real Gone" .
As him being a hit and miss. Thats sort of right, personally I see him as being 60/40 hit and miss at first, but his good songs can fucking kick ass. Some of his songs are so good infact that after hearing them a few times I appreciate his other songs even more. Tom waits is the type of artist in which the more you listen to his stuff the better he sounds and the worst everyone else sounds by comparison.
He gets exponentially better as you listen to more of his songs, and this is coming from someone who usually listens to a great song a few times and forgets about it after.
Tom Waits excells as an artist the same way in which Mike Tyson excelled as a boxer.
Anyways, sorry for the complicated answer to a simple question. I' m more familiar to individual songs than his albums but I can recommend a few good CDs.
Real Gone (this is the CD of his to get if you only buy one)
Blood Money
Alice
From my experience he usually has a few kick ass songs in ever album while the rest being aquired tastes. However after hearing his best songs even his mediocre (mediocre by his standard) sound far better to my ears then anything else by anyone else. Tom Waits is truely a musical in our time genius without peers.
I recommend using itunes store to sample his songs if you don' t have a P2P sharing program.
< Message edited by Agent Ghost -- 22 Dec 06 8:39:26 >