Waits, looking back at the period said: I was sick through that whole period [...] It was starting to wear on me, all the touring.

Robillard was hired by Tom Waits, who was looking for a blues guitarist and a master of American roots music for his Orphans Tour.

Her connection, ex-boyfriend Steve Waits, president of Marrakech Records ( a reference to Village People record label Casablanca Records ), is more interested in getting back with her than in Jack's music ( and more interested in taking business calls than in wooing Samantha ), but agrees to listen to a demo.

Waits was born at Park Avenue Hospital in Pomona, California, the son of Alma Fern ( née Johnson ) McMurray and Jesse Frank Waits, both schoolteachers.

By 1965, while attending Hilltop High School within the Sweetwater Union High School District, Chula Vista, Waits was playing in an R & B / soul band called The Systems and had begun his first job at Napoleone Pizza House in National City ( about which he would later sing on " I Can't Wait to Get Off Work ( And See My Baby on Montgomery Avenue )" from Small Change and " The Ghosts of Saturday Night ( After Hours at Napoleone's Pizza House )" on The Heart of Saturday Night ).

In 1971, Waits moved to the Echo Park neighborhood of L. A. ( at the time, also home to musicians Glenn Frey of the Eagles, J. D. Souther, Jackson Browne, and Frank Zappa ) and signed with Herb Cohen at the age of 21.

In 1975, Waits moved to the Tropicana Motel on Santa Monica Boulevard and released the double album Nighthawks at the Diner, recorded in a studio with a small audience in order to capture the ambience of a live show.

Franks Wild Years, a musical play by Waits and Brennan, was staged as an Off-Broadway musical in 1986, directed by Gary Sinise, in a successful run at Chicago's famed Steppenwolf Theater.

The play opened at the Los Angeles Theater Center in February 1989 to mixed reviews, although Waits ' performance was singled out by a number of critics, including John C. Mahoney, who described it as " mesmerizing.

The Black Rider: The Casting of the Magic Bullets — a theatrical collaboration of Waits, director Robert Wilson, and writer William S. Burroughs — premiered at Hamburg's Thalia Theatre on March 31, 1990.

At this time, Waits made a return to acting after a five-year break, marked at first by the re-release of his 1993 Jim Jarmusch-directed short Coffee and Cigarettes: Somewhere in California, costarring Iggy Pop, compiled in Coffee and Cigarettes.

In the movie, Waits appears in a dream scene as himself, singing the ballad " You Can Never Hold Back Spring " and accompanying himself at the piano.

Waits ' albums Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards and Alice are both included in metacritic. com's list of the " Top 200: Best-Reviewed Albums " since 2000 at # 10 and # 20, respectively ( as of November 2009 ).

On January 22, 2008, Waits made a rare live appearance in Los Angeles, performing at a benefit for Bet Tzedek Legal Services — The House of Justice, a nonprofit poverty law center.

* Discography at the Tom Waits Library

* Tom Waits at NPR Music, contains interviews

Its main period of use was, like the treble cornett, about 1550 to 1650, although it gained favor in England only after the beginning of the 17th century ; in 1622 the celebrated Norwich Waits possessed at least two.

*" Putnam County " is also a song by Tom Waits in his 1975 album Nighthawks at the Diner

Tom Waits sings a song about life in Putnam County on the 1975 album, " Nighthawks at the Diner ".

of brick-clad steel-piling was put into place to protect the town, most noticeably at the Waits where a pleasing plaza has also been created.

In 2004 and 2005, she played the Devil in William Burroughs ' and Tom Waits ' musical, The Black Rider, directed by Robert Wilson, which opened at London's Barbican Theatre, toured to San Francisco, but from which she was forced to withdraw prior to performances at the Sydney Festival, owing to exhaustion.

On June 13, 1975, at the start of a three-game series with the Texas Rangers, the Indians traded Perry to the Rangers in exchange for pitchers Jim Bibby, Jackie Brown, and Rick Waits.

Wilson worked first as a model in Australia and in Europe, before she moved to Los Angeles in 1991 to study acting with Arthur Mendoza at the Actors Circle Theatre and with Tom Waits at the TomKat Repertory Group.

During this period, Waits appeared in a series of minor movie roles, including a cameo role in Wolfen ( 1981 ) as an inebriated piano player, and his song " Jitterbug Boy " also appeared on the movie's soundtrack.

* David Coulter, Multi-Instrumentalist and Producer / Music Supervisor ; ex-member of Test Dept and The Pogues, has played Musical Saw on numerous albums and live with a who's who of Contemporary Popular Music: Damon Albarn, Gorillaz, Tom Waits, Hal Willner, Richard Hawley, Jarvis Cocker, Marianne Faithfull, Tim Robbins, The Tiger Lillies.

Waits has a distinctive voice, described by critic 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.

" With this trademark growl, his incorporation of pre-rock music styles such as blues, jazz, and vaudeville, and experimental tendencies verging on industrial music, Waits has built up a distinctive musical persona.

Lyrically, Waits ' songs frequently present atmospheric portrayals of grotesque, often seedy characters and places — although he has also shown a penchant for more conventional ballads.

While Waits has played the song live a number of times, an official version would not be released until 2007.

On February 24, 2011, it was announced via Waits ' official website that he has begun work on his next studio album.

Waits has steadfastly refused to allow the use of his songs in commercials and has joked about other artists who do ( commenting " If Michael Jackson wants to work for Pepsi, why doesn't he just get himself a suit and an office in their headquarters and be done with it ?").

Frito-Lay hired a Waits soundalike to sing a jingle similar to the song " Step Right Up " from the album Small Change, which is a song Waits has called " an indictment of advertising ".

Waits has also filed a lawsuit unrelated to music.

Singer Tom Waits claimed he cried upon viewing it and Eddie Van Halen has said that when he first saw the film, everyone else in the room with him laughed as he failed to see the humor in the film.

Along with Davies, the series has featured a widely diverse list of artists, including Culture Club, Willie Nelson and Johnny Cash, Kanye West, Tom Waits, and Def Leppard.

He has performed and recorded with Tom Waits, John Zorn, David Sylvian, Jack McDuff, Wilson Pickett, The Lounge Lizards, Arto Lindsay, T-Bone Burnett, Medeski, Martin and Wood, Cibo Matto, Elysian Fields, Sam Phillips, Elvis Costello, David Poe, Allen Ginsberg, Foetus, Robert Plant & Alison Krauss, Susana Baca, The Black Keys, Stan Ridgway, Vinicio Capossela, Alain Bashung, Lyenn, Hector Zazou, McCoy Tyner, Elton John, Madeline Peyroux, Marianne Faithfull, Leonid Fedorov, Tonio K, Andres Calamaro, Anarchist Republic of Bzzz and others.

Copeland has occasionally played drums for other artists including Peter Gabriel, Mike Rutherford and Tom Waits.

She primarily performs her own material, but also performs and has recorded cover versions of songs by artists such as Harry Nilsson, Loretta Lynn, Tom Waits, Nick Lowe, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Scott Walker, Randy Newman, Queen, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Sparks and Hank Williams.

Carney has released several solo albums and was a member of the Oranj Symphonette with fellow Waits alumni Joe Gore and Matt Brubeck.

Kronos has performed live with the poet Allen Ginsberg, Ástor Piazzolla, the Modern Jazz Quartet, Tom Waits, David Bowie, and Björk, and has appeared on recordings with such diverse artists as the Dave Matthews Band, Nelly Furtado, Rokia Traore, Joan Armatrading, Brazilian electronica artist Amon Tobin, Texas yodeler Don Walser, Faith No More, Tiger Lillies and David Grisman.

Russell Simins has produced, remixed and performed with numerous bands including Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Honeymoon Killers, Crowbar Massage, Cibo Matto, Grapevine, Ween, Luscious Jackson, Yoko Ono, Money Mark, Fred Schneider, Duran Duran, Asian Dub Foundation, Stereolab, Tom Waits, The Pierces, Tandy, Spalding Rockwell, The Morning Pages, Little Barrie, Jena Malone, Tiny Masters of Today and Harper Simon.

" Rolling Stone said that the album " contains the most blues of any album Waits has made " but added " the problem is that it's more of the same ", describing it as " the latest installment of discourse ," awarding the album three out of five stars.

Album closer " I Can't Wait to Get Off Work ( And See My Baby on Montgomery Avenue )" has a simple musical arrangement, boasting only Waits ' voice and piano.

* The song " The Piano Has Been Drinking ( Not Me ) ( An Evening with Pete King )" by Tom Waits has the line, " As the bouncer is a sumo wrestler creampuff Caspar Milquetoast ".