"Big Black Mariah"
'Rain Dogs', 1985
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As I’ve mentioned a time (time…time…) or two before, my other newsletter focuses on live Bob Dylan recordings. I love live Tom Waits recordings just as much, but unfortunately there are far, far fewer than of Dylan. The reasons are straightforward: He started later, his shows are less likely to be recorded, and — the main reason — he tours far, far less.
Tom hasn’t toured since 2008. Bob, by my rough calculation, has played 1,012 shows in the time; he just announced another month of dates as I write this! Meanwhile, Tom briefly came out of hiding to play three songs, none of which were taped.
Tom may not have the enthusiasm to tour that Bob does, but the live performances he did give before his seeming retirement from the road could be transcendent. So, for today’s entry on “Big Black Mariah,” I decided to listen some times he’s played that Rain Dogs track live.
The best known live version is undoubtedly the one that’s been officially released, off the live album Big Time. I didn’t realize until reading the Wikipedia page for the album that Tom’s voice was lowered in tone during post-production. Compare that official version to a (terrific) live version I found from roughly the same era in the mid-‘80s:
Also dig Tom’s little lyric addition there: “Here come that big black Mariah / Here come that big jambalaya.” And the closing marimba jam!
That big jambalaya was gone by this later version, slower and swampier and with a lot of jazzy piano flourishes, from 1990. Tom typically doesn’t rearrange his old songs quite as dramatically as Dylan does, but this qualifies as a fairly different approach to the song.
“Big Black Mariah” mostly disappeared from Tom’s shows after 1990. Between Bone Machine and Mule Variations, he soon had other songs in a similar vein to play ("Get Behind the Mule,” etc). It only popped up its head two more times.
The first came in 1998. Tom didn’t tour that year, but he did pop up at a Los Angeles benefit show tied to the film Dead Man Walking alongside Eddie Vedder, Ani DiFranco, and others. Here’s what Robert Hilburn wrote in the LA Times:
The first thing that hits you about Waits is his physicality. He throws his body into the music with all sorts of odd, unlikely contortions that suggest some neo-Frankenstein’s creature at work. His vocals are equally unconventional--a basic growl sometimes tempered by a tender falsetto, at other times distorted by a bullhorn.
Waits’ songs, too, rip through the conventional boundaries of pop with equal imagination and assault. As he combines images so mystical and extreme that you are both seduced and puzzled by them, he strikes you as the American Van Morrison. Few artists ever in pop have created their own world as fully and as commandingly.
On Sunday, Waits focused on relatively recent works, including “The Fall of Troy” and “Walk Away,” both from the “Dead Man” album, and “Goin’ Out West” and “Jesus Gonna Be Here,” both from his 1992 album, “Bone Machine.”
No love for “Big Black Mariah,” Robert? There should be - listen to Tom’s voice leap up into that wildman falsetto at 24:56.
He’s performed it just once in the 21st century, as part of an abbreviated tour promoting Orphans in 2006. He only did nine shows on that tour, the last of which was a late-night finale in Cleveland added at the last minute. He played it the very same night as a show in Akron, driving 45 minutes to Cleveland after he finished the first show, and taking the stage after midnight.
The wee-hours concert featured a pretty wild setlist, including one-time-only covers of Hank Williams’ “Ramblin’ Man” and Howlin’ Wolf’s “Spoonful” and the only time he’s ever played Orphans highlight “Buzz Fledderjohn.” And this, the only “Big Black Mariah” he’s played in the past 24 years. It’s definitely got the feel of a late-night at the blues club (ok, it’s a House of Blues club, but close enough).
Is the Cleveland show available in full anywhere?
What month of dates has Tom announced? I can't seem to find anything about it online.