Week 38 - Jockey Full of Bourbon (Tom Waits, 1985)

Week 38 - Tom Waits

Grand Finale of Tom Waits December!  The song that started it all for us.  We have been singing this song for so long that sometimes we even forget that it is a cover, ha!  We’ve been wanting to collaborate with our California half of the band and finally our dream came true.  Bi-coastal video!  Rebekah and I miss these gentlemen so much. Even though we didn’t play together in real life, I think this video portrays the feeling of what it is like when we do play together.  

I think it is important to close a year right and I’m glad we are able to do so with a style!  Hope you enjoy.  

Wishing you a very happy new year!

Week 37 - Tango Till They're Sore (Tom Waits, 1985)

Week 37 - Tom Waits

It was a very difficult task to pick songs from Tom Waits’s vast collection of songs.  And it was wonderful to see that so many people have such an affection for him and his songs.  In the end I decided to cover one of my all time favorite songs.  This was the song that made me fall in love with Tom Waits and I’ve tried to sing in the past but coudn’t quite get it.  So it was time to try again!  It’s the intro of the song that gets me every time so we had to work on that - it’s just so perfect in a drinking whiskey in the afternoon kind of way.  It also has the line “just get me to New Orleans” which is pretty much how I feel every time I think about that beautiful city.  As I was recording the song I realized that this song is probably about Mardi Gras, which meant we sang about entirely wrong holiday but that’s how we roll over here in Miwa Gemini land.  Enjoy.

Happy Holidays!

Week 36 - Innocent When You Dream (Tom Waits, 1987)

Week 36 - Tom Waits

I was editing this video this morning (which I tend to do because I’m always running WAY behind with this project) all was quiet while snowed outside.  It was beautiful and peaceful.  And I felt this song fits the mood of the day.  I’m not quite tired of the snow yet although ask me in March and I might have a different answer! 

Week 35 - Cemetery Polka (Tom Waits, 1985)

Week 35 - Tom Waits (1985)

One of the many things I love about Tom Waits is his ability to make music with just about anything.  Unusual instruments, unusual subject matters, unusual ideas, unusual situations - all of these things makes his world so exciting and interesting.  Like this week’s song, Cemetery Polka from the album Rain Dog. It's a song about aging relatives who are mostly insane, dying or both. Absurdity with a twisted sense of humor ran through this song and it includes some of my favorite rhymes like “egg” and “wooden leg” and “hotel” and “hell.”  

I read that Tom Waits walked around NYC recording street sounds and other ambient noises on a cassette recorder in order to catch the sound of the city for recording Rain Dog.  Rain Dog is one of my favorite albums and it makes me happy that it was written in my old neighborhood West Village, though I’m sure it was quite a different neighborhood back then.  

I’ve been wanting to to do all toy instrumentation and this seemed like a perfect opportunity.  We had a great time working on this song.  I hope you enjoy!

“If I want a sound, I usually feel better if I've chased it and killed it, skinned it and cooked it.”  - Tom Waits

And a happy belated birthday, Mr. Waits!

Week 34 of 52 Weeks - Hold On (Tom Waits, 1999)

Week 34 - Tom Waits

Week 1 of Tom Waits December!  Things changed for me drastically as an artist the day I discovered Tom Waits.  I love his originality - in his music, in his lyrics, in his style and in his imagination. And I love and love his sense of humor.  Frustratingly I’ve only seen him performance once and that was for his Mule Variation tour.  Still to this day, it’s one of my favorite shows of all times.  This song has been stuck in my head lately and was thinking about covering it, but there are just too many songs I want to cover.  Since it’s his birthday next week (12/7) I decided to dedicate this whole month exploring his world.  Hope you enjoy!

This one goes out to miss Erika - not only because we went to see Tom Waits together but also she has the best sense of humor and the most infectious laugh.