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- Mule Variations, Waits’ first studio album in six years, contains the most blues of any album he’s made.
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Rolling Stone said that the album "contains the most blues of any album [Tom Waits has] made" but added "the problem is that it's more of the same", describing it as "the latest installment of discourse" and awarding the album three out of five stars.
- Blues
May 13, 1999 · Mule Variations, Waits’ first studio album in six years, contains the most blues of any album he’s made. When he plays the Southern hayseed, he wants you to feel the chicken wire, breathe the...
- Ben Ratliff
- “Big in Japan” Mule Variations begins with a peculiar racket: a tape recording of Waits roaring in a Mexican hotel room like a wild animal. “I started screaming and banging on this chest of drawers really hard, ‘til it was kindling,” said Waits.
- “Lowside of the Road” “Lowside of the Road” was inspired by a blues anecdote. The story goes that in 1930, Lead Belly was jumped by a group of white men, produced the penknife he used as a guitar slide, and summarily went to jail for attempted murder.
- “Hold On” Just as Variations threatens to topple into darkness, Waits delivers “Hold On,” one of his warmest, most empathetic songs. It began with the Waitsian sight of a street dancer in freezing weather.
- “Get Behind the Mule” “Get Behind the Mule” is a song of instructions. Don’t let the weeds get higher than the garden. Keep a diamond in your mind. Meet me by the fall-down tree.
Apr 17, 2024 · Whether he’s assimilating sewing machines, turntable scratches, congas on “Get Behind the Mule” that sound like samples from a game of ping pong, or dozens of wrinkles on blues-guitar and crying-piano options, it’s all just varying and fortifying an established signature.
We’d done the song, “Get Behind the Mule.”. We’d done it several times. We did a Chinese version, and we did a cha-cha version, and a raga version – and a cappella. And so, at one point ...
Apr 27, 1999 · So far, reviews of Mule Variations have been mixed, ranging from shameless hero worship (yeah, yeah, like this one), to jaded critics claiming that Waits hit his songwriting peak with 1985's...
Apr 27, 1999 · Blues has always been an element of Waits' music; you can hear it on every album he's made, even under the accordions and found percussion of Black Rider. Here, though, is where it steps to the fore. Mule Variations is Waits as blues singer, pure and simple.
