Woyzeck background - Blood Money [301a]

Returning to deliver our GCSE Drama lecture for the season, Callum Hughes chats with Martin and Sam about the theatrical history of Woyzeck, some of the themes present in the play, and gives us a jumping off point for the Waits album to come.

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
Misery Is the River of the World, Blood Money, Tom Waits (2002)

Woyzeck to go (Buechner in 9 minutes), Sommer's World Literature to go, via Youtube (2017)

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Carnival - The Black Rider [223]

A third week with David & Callum brings Sam & Martin to the end of The Black Rider album, although we reach back to much earlier in the play. Ideas of carnival celebrations in a British context are compared to the American funfair/freakshow image, and we take a bit of time to think about the ideology of the play and album in general. 

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
Carnival The Black Rider, Tom Waits (1993)

Good Morning, recorded on the drag during UK Panorama 2017, Endurance Steel Orchestra/Peter Ram (2017)

Good Morning, Single, Peter Ram (2016)

Carnival at 25m17s from The Black Rider: The Casting of the 12 Magic Bullets (filmed at the Weiner Festwochen, via YouTube), Wilson/Burroughs/Waits (1990)

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The Last Rose Of Summer - The Black Rider [222]

Moving into a coda of sorts (both in the album and the play) Callum, David, Sam & Martin discuss the way Waits winds down The Black Rider with this final “proper” song. With some full-blooded disagreement over comparison between the theatre and album versions, Song by Song edges towards the conclusion of this very complicated album. 

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
The Last Rose Of Summer, The Black Rider, Tom Waits (1993)

The Last Rose of Summer (and extra audience chat) at 2h0m11s from The Black Rider: The Casting of the 12 Magic Bullets (filmed at the Weiner Festwochen, via YouTube), Wilson/Burroughs/Waits (1990)

The Last Rose Of Summer (and extra audience chat) at 2h16m10s from The Black Rider: The Casting of the 12 Magic Bullets (filmed at the Barbican Centre, London, via YouTube), Wilson/Burroughs/Waits (2004)

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Lucky Day - The Black Rider [221]

Theatre-maker David Shopland joins his collaborator and returning guest Callum Hughes (plus the usual goofs Martin & Sam) to listen to this climactic track from The Black Rider. We discuss fusion of Waits’s traditional mode of writing with the theatrical context, the nature of his writing throughout the album, as well as the writing of Belle & Sebastian. Stick with us to the end of the episode for a brief bonus performance...

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
Lucky Day, The Black Rider, Tom Waits (1993)

My Wandering Days Are Over, Tigermilk, Belle & Sebastian (1996)

Lucky Day at 1h54m55s from The Black Rider: The Casting of the 12 Magic Bullets (filmed at the Weiner Festwochen, via YouTube), Wilson/Burroughs/Waits (1990)

The "Priest" They Called Him, Single, William S. Burroughs & Kurt Cobain (1993)

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I Can't Wait to Get Off Work (And See My Baby on Montgomery Avenue) - Small Change [046]

Welcome to the conclusion of Season four! Martin, Sam and Callum conclude their observations on Tom Waits’s Small Change with a look at this quiet, calmer and more accepting song, discussing the opposition raised by this track between work and art, as well as the way it puts the feel of the album as a whole in context. Thanks to all our guests; Jeffrey Cranor, Lucy Dallas and Callum Hughes, and we hope you’ll join us later in August for season five of Song by Song!

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
I Can't Wait to Get Off Work (And See My Baby on Montgomery Avenue), Small Change, Tom Waits (1976)

Frankly, Mr. Shankly, The Queen Is Dead, The Smiths (1986)

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Small Change (Got Rained on with His Own .38) - Small Change [045]

Heading into the final tracks of Small Change, Song by Song joins the bystanders watching the death of Small Change, in the title track Small Change... gets his money's worth from a phrase, that Tom Waits... This week Martin, Sam and Callum discuss some of the pejorative impact of choice of language in lyrics, as well as the relationship between improvisational virtuoso and precision storyteller.

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
Small Change (Got Rained on with His Own .38), Small Change, Tom Waits (1976)

Be-Bop, The Rites of Pan, Lew Tabackin (1978/2009)

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The One That Got Away - Small Change [044]

As we approach the end of Small Change, Tom Waits shifts up a gear by telling not one but eight short stories in a single song, prompting Martin, Sam and Callum to discuss the dexterity and flair of his language, the push towards and against traditional images of loss, and the traumatic life and work of Judy Garland - all in a day's work for Song by Song. 

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
The One That Got Away, Small Change, Tom Waits (1976)

The Man That Got Away - Live at Great American Music Hall, Mystery White Boy, Jeff Buckley (2000)

The Man That Got Away, from A Star Is Born (via YouTube), Judy Garland (1954)

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Bad Liver and a Broken Heart (In Lowell) - Small Change [043]

Song by Song returns to the bar as Tom Waits examines the state of his own internal organs, telling the story of another lost woman and another endless spiral into drunken sorrow. New guest host Callum Hughes joins Sam and Martin to discuss the finer points of 1940s cinema, the genetic predisposition of men and women's eye colour and, naturally, Callum's ability to make a daiquiri.

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
Bad Liver and a Broken Heart (In Lowell), Small Change, Tom Waits (1976)

Old Red Eyes Is Back, 0898 Beautiful South, The Beautiful South (1992)

Play It Sam… Play "As Time Goes By", Casablanca Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, Ingrid Bergman/Dooley Wilson/Humphrey Bogart (1997/2013)

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