Over 40 years of loving Bob and still he astounds…. his vodka paintbrush of absurdity, vaudeville, heartbreak and forgiveness and imagination of the infinite is still wet and painting backdrops backwards behind the Mirror into the wee hours of the morning of his opening night! We will always be suspended in his orbit……
No one could paint like Bob with light…he collaborated with great lighting designers who patiently, arduously, took his elaborately detailed visions and precise instructions into the days that became nights….he found all the things that live between the membrane and the weathervane…..
Bob was among the artists who see, feel, hear, and sense the world in a way that most don’t experience it and want that experience to be shared and to connect others also immersed and suspended between the breaths of Life.
Bob set course for the unseen portals of his imagination and gathered brave, adventurous, devoted, gifted, and brilliant artists, and crews and devotees and opened many hearts and eyes. Bob had to be valiant, dictatorial, curious, ever listening, wily, playful, deluded, strategic, flirtatious, fallible, political, and willing to protect and persevere against all doubters, critics, compass navigators, naysayers well intentioned or not.
Bob was an absolute amethyst of an actor…. a space floating astronaut and, to paraphrase Lewis Carroll’s Queen in ALICE, he regularly dreamed 6 impossible things before breakfast to stage, to paint, to costume, to build, draw, perform, choreograph, film, design…….to light into Life and darkness.
He could make his mind as still as the surface of an evening summer lake then shift into scribbling dance — epileptic, musical, static and trancelike… He trusted and confided in his Muses and created a field of concentration calm as a stoic monolithic rock rising out of rollicking sea.
To get Bob, first, you must believe in the dandelion floatness in the smokey pale light horizon beyond the proscenium…. then smooth out the blanket of time and pour a bottle of ink on the emptiness and call its shape the title of your new show!
Always attune, to a finger, a face, a chin, a leg, a tear, a gesture, a shape, an ear, a branch, a child under the table, the stalk of blooming cactus…..or an unplanned sneeze that turns on the Christmas lights as you the say the word….SCHLEP! His actors ever game and skillful would, upon Bob’s suggestions and their imaginations, would turn their bodies into the letter G or throw up their arms like the wings of a crow and open their mouths in a silent scream…. Bob s-l-o-w-e-d everything down, the actors moved as if underwater….the audience experienced a flower blooming in real time.
Robert Wilson. Bob. Beloved Bob. Biscuits and Gravy Bob, Elegant Bob.
And…with his down-home heart and pure prisms of light mind and a wild and wicked Texas cackle ripping up yellow lightning in a black sky desert…Forever Bob….
Tom and Kathleen Read More
No one could paint like Bob with light…he collaborated with great lighting designers who patiently, arduously, took his elaborately detailed visions and precise instructions into the days that became nights….he found all the things that live between the membrane and the weathervane…..
Bob was among the artists who see, feel, hear, and sense the world in a way that most don’t experience it and want that experience to be shared and to connect others also immersed and suspended between the breaths of Life.
Bob set course for the unseen portals of his imagination and gathered brave, adventurous, devoted, gifted, and brilliant artists, and crews and devotees and opened many hearts and eyes. Bob had to be valiant, dictatorial, curious, ever listening, wily, playful, deluded, strategic, flirtatious, fallible, political, and willing to protect and persevere against all doubters, critics, compass navigators, naysayers well intentioned or not.
Bob was an absolute amethyst of an actor…. a space floating astronaut and, to paraphrase Lewis Carroll’s Queen in ALICE, he regularly dreamed 6 impossible things before breakfast to stage, to paint, to costume, to build, draw, perform, choreograph, film, design…….to light into Life and darkness.
He could make his mind as still as the surface of an evening summer lake then shift into scribbling dance — epileptic, musical, static and trancelike… He trusted and confided in his Muses and created a field of concentration calm as a stoic monolithic rock rising out of rollicking sea.
To get Bob, first, you must believe in the dandelion floatness in the smokey pale light horizon beyond the proscenium…. then smooth out the blanket of time and pour a bottle of ink on the emptiness and call its shape the title of your new show!
Always attune, to a finger, a face, a chin, a leg, a tear, a gesture, a shape, an ear, a branch, a child under the table, the stalk of blooming cactus…..or an unplanned sneeze that turns on the Christmas lights as you the say the word….SCHLEP! His actors ever game and skillful would, upon Bob’s suggestions and their imaginations, would turn their bodies into the letter G or throw up their arms like the wings of a crow and open their mouths in a silent scream…. Bob s-l-o-w-e-d everything down, the actors moved as if underwater….the audience experienced a flower blooming in real time.
Robert Wilson. Bob. Beloved Bob. Biscuits and Gravy Bob, Elegant Bob.
And…with his down-home heart and pure prisms of light mind and a wild and wicked Texas cackle ripping up yellow lightning in a black sky desert…Forever Bob….
Tom and Kathleen Read More
Feb
25
25
"The Last Ride"
Tom Waits performs & reads poetry in the new documentary about homelessness in the American South. Read More
In honor of The Heart Of Saturday Night’s 50th Anniversary, ANTI- is reissuing the album in two limited edition vinyl colors:
Slightly Gold – (Limited to 800 copies - SOLD OUT) Mailing list subscribers get first listen on new releases and first dibs on merchandise which is often in limited editions in the Tom Waits Webstore. Read More
Slightly Gold – (Limited to 800 copies - SOLD OUT) Mailing list subscribers get first listen on new releases and first dibs on merchandise which is often in limited editions in the Tom Waits Webstore. Read More
In celebration of Mule Variations' and ANTI- Records' 25th Anniversary, the GRAMMY Award winning album is being re-issued on 180g Silver Vinyl.
The 1999 release of his thirteenth studio album Mule Variations offers the most complete picture of his artistry while also marking the beginning of the indie label ANTI- Records. On this album, edgy stomps, humor and experimentation are interspersed with some of the most beautiful and personal songs he’s ever written.
Order Here. Read More
The 1999 release of his thirteenth studio album Mule Variations offers the most complete picture of his artistry while also marking the beginning of the indie label ANTI- Records. On this album, edgy stomps, humor and experimentation are interspersed with some of the most beautiful and personal songs he’s ever written.
Order Here. Read More
Tom Waits – Get Behind The Mule (Spiritual)
In celebration of Mule Variations’ 25th anniversary this year, today a previously unheard rendition of the song “Get Behind The Mule” has been released. In this alternate take of the album's iconic track, Waits' gospel moans resonate with raw emotion, accompanied only by a gritty Wurlitzer. This stripped-down rendition amplifies the dark narrative of murder and perseverance, with the lyrics even slightly altered, rendering it with an even starker intensity than the original LP version.
Stream: https://tomwaits.ffm.to/gbtms Read More
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