This is Waits's most harrowing album ever, thanks not only to such heartwarming sentiments as "What does it matter, a dream of love or a dream of lies / We're all going to be in the same place when we die" but also to the ravaged, shamanistic croak with which he delivers them. Death hangs like a bad suit on songs like "Jesus Gonna Be Here," "The Ocean Doesn't Want Me," and "Murder in the Red Barn." But the album is musically entrancing and richly...   Show More

This is Waits's most harrowing album ever, thanks not only to such heartwarming sentiments as "What does it matter, a dream of love or a dream of lies / We're all going to be in the same place when we die" but also to the ravaged, shamanistic croak with which he delivers them. Death hangs like a bad suit on songs like "Jesus Gonna Be Here," "The Ocean Doesn't Want Me," and "Murder in the Red Barn." But the album is musically entrancing and richly poetic--"Are you still jumping out of windows in expensive clothes?" Waits asks a perennially unfaithful lover in "Who Are You." There's also room for some foolishness, as with "I Don't Wanna Grow Up," which has been memorably covered by the Ramones, and a boozy sing-along (with Keith Richards), "That Feel." --Daniel Durchholz   Show Less