Oh! My! God! What a stomping gig!
Tom Waits played the Ratcellar in the Phoenix Park on Thursday night (31st July).
Just a bit of background: The Ratcellar, a.k.a. the Marquee (well, if not the actual one, for all intents and purposes), was set up in the Phoenix Park for the run of the trio of gigs ending the European leg of his Glitter and Doom tour.
The gig was due to start at 8pm but the very relaxed crowd was still wandering in and around well after deadline. Hats (pork pies mostly – I think) were in proliferation among the men, as were suits. A very sartorially elegant bunch, high on the arty-barometer. Age ranged from in and around my age, mmphf, to sixties plus. The occasional young ones in their early twenties were being ferried mini bottles of wine by doting papas, cheerful staff were helping good-looking young men with their overloaded drinks order by fishing their tickets out of their back pockets and kindly replacing them after being checked, no messing or overt drunkenness was evident – people were even eating ice cream as they were waiting - and I’m pretty sure I spotted that pop pixie, Duke Special, heading for the front. Music which sounded like it came from a ‘40s ticket-a-dance hall was on in the background, lending a kind of sad and slightly sleazy air.
By half eight, I figured that that was the perfect time to pop out to the loos – just about a minute later I heard a roar go up from inside the tent (the band arriving) followed by one even louder (the arrival of Mr Waits) but it did result in my having the wonderful sight of aged, sorry, distinguished men legging it from the portaloos to get back to their seats. You don’t see something like that every day.
Have I mentioned that the staff were superb? Well, they were. I don’t know where the order came from – Mr Waits or the general gig management - but there was a hold on people just wandering in during a number and all were held back from entering the main arena of the tent while Mr Waits was performing. Brilliant! No-one minded and it kept the disruption down. They also gave every appearance of being in thoroughly good humour, especially when one punter tried to take a photograph while standing next to one of them. That was actually rather funny.
By the time I did get back to my seat, Mr Waits was just finished the first number, which I’d seen from the sidelines. He was bathed in an orange/red light, standing on a raised podium, lit round the edge with coloured bulbs, covered in grit, which raised in great dusty clouds when he stomped his feet (which was a lot, by the way). Looking like a modern shaman, on a stage cluttered with equipment and instruments, decorated with a overgrown hat tree of tannoy speakers, wearing his dusty old three-piece black suit, black shirt and black bowler hat (yes, bowler, not trilby or pork pie), raising his hands in fists, grimacing at the music. Surrounded by the band, he belted out tracks like ‘the thing about human kind is there’s nothing kind about humans’ (I’m very bad with names) before moving to the piano for some quieter numbers. A note on the band – there was percussion, keyboard, upright bass, guitar, sax and clarinet. His sons, Casey and Sullivan Waits were on stage (I wonder what it’s like working with dear ol’ dad?), on percussion and clarinet. The whole lot of them were superb but the saxophonist, Vincent Henry, took the biscuit – every time you looked over, he was playing two saxes at once. Aagh! You can just picture the rehearsal where that was decided…”Hey, lads, look at this! I worked it out in the pub last night!” “Brilliant! Do it on stage!” “Oh, bloodyhell…”
The section where he sat at the piano with the upright bass behind him was gorgeous. I don’t know whether it was the PMT in me but when the crowd sang along to ‘innocent when you dream’ like they were at the Grand Ol’ Opry, it brought tears to my eyes. In a good way. Yes, Mr Waits, I agree, it was beautiful.
By the bye, Mr Waits is the King of Cheese. I had no idea. But he was forever telling us ‘one last thing’ – bits of trivia, nonsense and very, very bad jokes. He got more chatty as the night went on. He also appreciated our abilities as an audience, I must tell you. After the singing, came the clapping. Lads, we were brilliant. We were rhythmic, together, we sensed the way the music was going (mostly) and gave him dynamics, fade ins & outs and handled any complexity he threw at us (though there wasn’t much of that, now I think of it). I think he liked it. He certainly had us clapping a lot.
Now his voice is not gravely. Not any more. He has gone beyond the gravely description, so far beyond it, it doesn’t do the roiling incoherency of it any justice. The closest geological description (to continue a theme) was as if he were singing from beneath a rubbly, muddy stream bed. Not the best description, I’ll grant you, but at least it’s not ‘gravely’.
There was so much in this gig, I have pages of notes, but I’d be here all night and you’d be asleep. There was the sudden downpour, which made an unexpected entrance in the tent over the rows behind us, forcing several people to abandon ship for elsewhere in the tent. There was the over two hours of sheer and unparalleled woompf on stage from Mr Waits and his merry band before taking a break. There was the over five (five!) minutes (minutes!) he made us wait before he came back out for the encore. There was the astonishing and medicine man-like outpouring of ‘Hoist That Rag’ (and our best clapping moment) which resulted in a oh-so-totally-deserved standing ovation. The be-glittered ‘Make it rain’. The stomp-operated school-house bell. The multi-talented, multi-instrumented band. The strutting, posing joy that was Mr Waits.
It’s a pity there’s only one of him. It must be fun, being Tom Waits.
