Tom Waits

Thomas Alan Waits (born December 7, 1949) is an American singer, songwriter, composer and actor. His lyrics often focus on society's underbelly and are delivered in his trademark deep, gravelly voice. He began in the folk scene during the 1970s, but his music since the 1980s has reflected the influence of such diverse genres as rock, jazz, Delta blues, opera, vaudeville, cabaret, funk and experimental techniques verging on industrial music. Jim Fusilli calls him "A keen, sensitive and sympathetic chronicler of the adrift and downtrodden" who "creates three-dimensional characters who, even in their confusion and despair, are capable of insight and startling points of view." His unique voice was described by Daniel Durchholz as sounding "like it was soaked in a vat of bourbon, left hanging in the smokehouse for a few months, and then taken outside and run over with a car."

Tom Waits was born into a middle-class family in Pomona, California, who then moved to Whittier in 1949. His family lived on Kentucky Avenue (and briefly Pickering Avenue), a pivotal setting for his memories. Inspired by the work of Bob Dylan and the Beat Generation, he began singing on the San Diego folk circuit. He moved to Los Angeles in 1972, where he worked as a songwriter before signing a recording contract with Asylum Records. His debut album was Closing Time (1973), followed by The Heart of Saturday Night (1974) and Nighthawks at the Diner (1975). He toured the United States, Europe, and Japan, finding greater critical and commercial success with Small Change (1976), Blue Valentine (1978), and Heartattack and Vine (1980). In 1978, Waits entered the world of film, where he met Kathleen Brennan. He collaborated with Crystal Gayle on the soundtrack of Francis Ford Coppola's One From the Heart (1982) and made cameos in several Coppola films.