Tom Waits quotes - page 5

The sight of the first woman in the minimal two-piece was as explosive as the detonation of the atomic bomb by the U.S. at Bikini Island in the Marshall Isles, hence the naming of the bikini. (Tom Waits)
When you're a kid and you're trying to find your own voice, it's rather daunting to hear somebody like Howlin' Wolf, because you know that you'll never achieve that. View quote
Tom Waits
George Bush is a fan of mine, he came to see me in the Seventies. His coke dealer brought him. View quote
Tom Waits
Oh, I got a beautiful 1959 Cadillac Coupe DeVille four-door. No one will ride in it with me. View quote
Tom Waits
Any image I have, it's just what I do, but it comes off as being very pretentious. When you're a bit in the public astigmatism, anything you do seems like you did it so somebody would see you do it, like showing up at the right parties. View quote
Tom Waits
I do like books on anatomy. I have to say I'm an amateur physician, I guess. View quote
Tom Waits
George Burns was a Vaudeville performer I particularly loved. View quote
Tom Waits
I always had a great appreciation for jazz, but I'm a very pedestrian musician. I get by. I like to think that my main instrument is vocabulary. View quote
Tom Waits
Sometimes words are just music themselves. Like 'Chicago' is a very musical sounding name. View quote
Tom Waits
As a kid, I did want to be an old-timer, since they were the ones with the big stories and the cool clothes. I wanted to go there. Now, I guess I want to bring that with me and go back in time. View quote
Tom Waits
I didn't really want to be part of a clique or a niche. But I also was looking for my own voice, as a writer, y'know? And a world I could call my own. (Tom Waits)
What you want is for music to love you back. That's why you pay your dues. You want to feel like you belong and are part of this symbiosis, metamorphosis, whatever you want to call it. View quote
Tom Waits
Any place is good for eavesdropping, if you know how to eavesdrop. View quote
Tom Waits
You hope people are going to be listening to you after you're gone. And they like you better after you're gone. View quote
Tom Waits
Sometimes the magnetism of a song is impossible to ignore, and it demands that it be sung in a certain way. View quote
Tom Waits
Most songs that aren't jump-rope songs, or lullabies, are cautionary tales or goodbye songs and road songs. View quote
Tom Waits
I always liked the idea that America is a big facade. We are all insects crawling across on the shiny hood of a Cadillac. We're all looking at the wrapping. But we won't tear the wrapping to see what lies beneath. View quote
Tom Waits
I think this whole division between the genres has more to do with marketing than anything else. It's terrible for the culture of music. View quote
Tom Waits
Mostly I straddle reality and the imagination. My reality needs imagination like a bulb needs a socket. My imagination needs reality like a blind man needs a cane. View quote
Tom Waits
Don't look back, because someone might be gaining on you. View quote
Tom Waits
Their memory's like a train: you can see it getting smaller as it pulls away And the things you can't remember Tell the things you can't forget that History puts a saint in every dream. (Tom Waits)
I'm just trying to make a buck like everyone else. View quote
Tom Waits
You know what I really love? The CD players in a car. How when you put the CD right up by the slot, it actually takes it out of your hand, like it's hungry. It pulls it in, and you feel like it wants more silver discs. View quote
Tom Waits
I guess I've always lived upside down when I want things I can't have. View quote
Tom Waits
I don't know if any genuine meaningful change could ever result from a song. It's kind of like throwing peanuts at a gorilla. View quote
Tom Waits