Brian Jones plucked the haunting sitar melody at the 1966 L.A. session for this classic. Bill Wyman added klezmer-flavored organ; studio legend Jack Nitzsche played the gypsy-style piano. “Brian had pretty much given up on the guitar by then,” said Richards. “If there was [another] instrument around, he had to be able to get something out of it. It gave the Stones on record a lot of different textures.”
~rollingstone.com
The principal riff of “Paint It Black” (almost all classic Rolling Stones songs are highlighted by a killer riff) was played on a sitar by Brian Jones and qualifies as perhaps the most effective use of the Indian instrument in a rock song. The exotic twang was a perfect match for the dark, mysterious Eastern-Indian melody, which sounded a little like a soundtrack to an Indian movie hijacked into hyperdrive.
~Richie Unterberger (allmusic.com)
Original version:
Wikipedia:
from the album Aftermath
B-side
“Stupid Girl” (US)
“Long Long While” (UK)
Released
7 May 1966 (US)
13 May 1966 (UK)
Format
7″
Recorded
6–9 March 1966
Genre
Psychedelic rock, raga rock
Length
3:45 (mono single mix)
3:22 (stereo album mix)
Label
London 45-LON.901 (US)
Decca F.12395 (UK)
Writer(s)
Jagger/Richards
Producer
Andrew Loog Oldham
“Paint It, Black” is a song released by The Rolling Stones on 13 May 1966 (7 May 1966 – US) as the first single from the US version of their fourth album Aftermath. It was originally titled “Paint It Black” without a comma. Keith Richards has stated that the comma was added by the record label, Decca.
At a book signing in Nashville in 2001, Bill Wyman explained that the comma was simply a typographical error that stuck.
The song was written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Mick Jagger wrote the lyrics and Keith Richards wrote the music.
Bill Wyman claims in his books that the song was a group effort although it was credited to Jagger/Richards.
The single reached number one in both the United States and the United Kingdom charts in 1966.
In 2004 it was ranked number 176 on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. In the US and UK, it was the first number one single to feature a sitar.
Live version:
Musicians:
Mick Jagger – lead vocals
Brian Jones – sitar, percussion
Keith Richards – electric guitar, acoustic guitar, backing vocals
David Hidalgo (born October 6, 1954 in Los Angeles, California) is an American singer-songwriter, best known for his work with the band Los Lobos. He is also a member of the supergroup Los Super Seven and of the Latin Playboys, a side project band made up of some of the members of Los Lobos. He formed another side project band with Mike Halby of Canned Heat, called Houndog.
Hidalgo’s songs have been covered by the Jerry Garcia Band, Waylon Jennings, Bonnie Raitt and others. He performed at Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Guitar Festival 2010. His son, David Hidalgo, Jr. is the current drummer for Social Distortion.
In addition to his work with Los Lobos, Hidalgo frequently plays musical instruments such as accordion, violin, 6-string banjo, cello, requinto jarocho, percussion, drums and guitar as a session musician for other artists’ releases.
(read more at Wikipedia)
Recently he has played with Bob Dylan and Tom Waits.
Here he is part of the fantastic band backing Mr. Waits on Letterman in July 2012:
Album of the day, Colossal Head by Hidalgo’s main band, Los Lobos:
Here are some of the people he has worked with:
Buckwheat Zydeco (multiple projects),
T-Bone Burnett (self titled 1986 album),
Peter Case (The Man with the Blue Post Modern Fragmented Neo-Traditionalist Guitar),
Elvis Costello (harmony vocal on King of America, guitar and harmony vocal on Momofuku),
Crowded House (multiple projects),
John Lee Hooker (multiple projects),
Roy Orbison (King of Hearts),
Willy DeVille (Backstreets of Desire, Crow Jane Alley)
Ozomatli (multiple projects),
Dolly Parton (Treasures),
Pierce Pettis (Chase the Buffalo),
Paul Simon (Graceland),
Marc Ribot (Border Music)
Tonio K. (Olé),
Suzanne Vega (99.9°F)
Tom Waits (multiple projects),
The 1994 tribute to songwriter Mark Heard, Strong Hand of Love,
Leo Kottke album Try And Stop Me
Gov’t Mule (guitar and vocals), on The Deepest End, Live in Concert
Bob Dylan (Accordion on Together Through Life and Christmas In The Heart, guitar, accordion, violin on Tempest)
G. Love & Special Sauce (Viola on “Missing My Baby”)
Los Cenzontles (co producer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist) Songs of Wood & Steel
Taj Mahal & Los Cenzontles (co producer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist) “American Horizon”
“We are all just monkeys with money and guns.”
~Tom Waits
If you get far enough away you’ll be on your way back home.
~Tom Waiys – “Blind Love”
From Wikipedia:
Released
30 September 1985
Recorded
RCA Studios
Genre
Rock, experimental rock
Length
53:46
Label
Island
Producer
Tom Waits
Rain Dogs is the 9th album by American singer-songwriter Tom Waits, released in September 1985 on Island Records.A loose concept album about “the urban dispossessed” of New York City, Rain Dogs is generally considered the middle album of a trilogy that includes Swordfishtrombones and Franks Wild Years.
The album, which includes appearances by guitarists Keith Richards and Marc Ribot, is noted for its broad spectrum of musical styles and genres, described by Rolling Stone as merging “Kurt Weill, pre-rock integrity from old dirty blues, [and] the elegiac melancholy of New Orleans funeral brass, into a singularly idiosyncratic American style.”
The album peaked at #29 on the UK charts and #188 on the US Billboard Top 200. In 1989, it was ranked #21 on the Rolling Stone list of the “100 greatest albums of the 1980s.” In 2003, the album was ranked number 397 on the magazine’s list of “The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time”.
Pitchfork Media listed Rain Dogs as 8th best album of the 1980s. Slant Magazine listed the album at #14 on its list of “Best Albums of the 1980’s”.
Reception:
From allmusic – William Ruhlmann:
With its jarring rhythms and unusual instrumentation — marimba, accordion, various percussion — as well as its frequently surreal lyrics, Rain Dogs is very much a follow-up to Swordfishtrombones, which is to say that it sounds for the most part like The Threepenny Opera being sung by Howlin’ Wolf. The chief musical difference is the introduction of guitarist Marc Ribot, who adds his noisy leads to the general cacophony. But Rain Dogs is sprawling where its predecessor had been focused: Tom Waits‘ lyrics here sometimes are imaginative to the point of obscurity, seemingly chosen to fit the rhythms rather than for sense. In the course of 19 tracks and 54 minutes, Waits sometimes goes back to the more conventional music of his earlier records, which seems like a retreat, though such tracks as the catchy “Hang Down Your Head,” “Time,” and especially “Downtown Train” (frequently covered and finally turned into a Top Ten hit by Rod Stewart five years later) provide some relief as well as variety. Read more over @ allmusic.com
From The Guardian – Killian Fox:
……………….. I can’t choose all three albums as my all-time favourite, so Rain Dogs – the best by a snout – clinches it. Waits had refreshed his sound on Swordfishtrombones two years earlier by moving beyond piano and guitar to dabble with a wider variety of instruments, and on Rain Dogs his repertoire continued to expand, with pump organs, accordions and bowed saws. He also gained the talents of guitarist Marc Ribot, whose humid Cuban licks on Jockey Full of Bourbon perfectly complement Waits’s suave dishevelment.
The range of musical styles sprawled, too, and Rain Dogs contains cabaret numbers, country songs, gospel, polkas, ballads and sea shanties. Waits is a sucker for the theatrical, and the ragbag cast here is at the carnivalesque end of things, plus sad-eyed dames and a girl with tattooed tear – “one for every year he’s away, she said” – at the late-night, romantically downbeat, Edward Hopper-ish end. (Most of the album was written in a lower Manhattan basement.)
The album has been noted as one of the most important musically and critically in Waits’ career, in particular to the new direction which he undertook from 1983’s Swordfishtrombones onwards.
The album is notable for its many different musical styles; among the album’s 19 tracks are two instrumentals (“Midtown” and “Bride of Rain Dog”), a polka (“Cemetery Polka”), a “kind of a New Orleans thing with trombone” (“Tango Till They’re Sore”), ballads (“Time”), pop music (“Downtown Train”), and “a gospel thing” (“Anywhere I Lay My Head”). “Blind Love” marks Waits’ first fully-fledged attempt at the country genre. As Waits said on the Rain Dogs Island Promo Tape (which consisted of taped comments on songs as sent to radio stations, circa late 1985):
“Blind Love” is one of my first country songs. I like Merle Haggard. Most of those other guys, though, sound like they’re all just drinking tea and watching their waist and talking to their accountant. This one I think subscribes to some of that roadhouse feel.
The song “Hang Down Your Head” is loosely based on the folk song “Tom Dooley“, with the lyrics altered but the melody remaining mostly intact.
Rolling Stone called Rain Dogs Waits’ “finest portrait of the tragic kingdom of the streets.”The album’s title comes from an expression which suggests such an atmosphere. Waits cast further light on the metaphor by stating that the album was about “People who live outdoors. You know how after the rain you see all these dogs that seem lost, wandering around. The rain washes away all their scent, all their direction. So all the people on the album are knit together, by some corporeal way of sharing pain and discomfort.”
According to Barney Hoskyns, the album’s general theme of “the urban dispossessed” was inspired in part by Martin Bell’s 1984 documentary Streetwise, to which Waits had been asked to contribute music.
Track Listing:
“Singapore” 2:46
“Clap Hands” 3:47
“Cemetery Polka” 1:51
“Jockey Full of Bourbon” 2:45
“Tango Till They’re Sore” 2:49
“Big Black Mariah” 2:44
“Diamonds & Gold” 2:31
“Hang Down Your Head” Kathleen Brennan, Waits 2:32
“Time” 3:55
“Rain Dogs” 2:56
“Midtown” (instrumental) 1:00
“9th & Hennepin” 1:58
“Gun Street Girl” 4:37
“Union Square” 2:24
“Blind Love” 4:18
“Walking Spanish” 3:05
“Downtown Train” 3:53
“Bride of Rain Dog” (instrumental) 1:07
“Anywhere I Lay My Head”
Personnel:
Performer
Tom Waits – vocals (1–10, 12–17, 19), guitar (2, 4, 6, 8–10, 15–17), organ (3, 19), piano (5, 12), pump organ (8), harmonium (18), banjo (13)
Musicians
Tom Waits – vocals (1–10, 12–17, 19), guitar (2, 4, 6, 8–10, 15–17), organ (3, 19), piano (5, 12), pump organ (8), harmonium (18), banjo (13)
Here is one of Tom Waits best songs from his brilliant album “Rain Dogs” (I’ll come back to this album tomorrow).
From allmusic – Bill Janovitz:
The street-poet and boho balladeer side of Tom Waits is on full display on this urban hymn. “Downtown Train” tackles the alienating anonymity of city life while simultaneously capturing the old romance of New York City and the potential small-town neighborhood feel of areas like Brooklyn. This romantic song about pursuing a love has some trademark sharp and quintessential Waits lines like “I’m shining like a new dime,” which seem old-fashioned in a warm and welcoming way, like the well-worn catch phrases your father or grandfather might toss around. The verses of “Downtown Train” are chock-full with more concrete and evocative images than all of the contemporary Top 40 pop hits combined; images like “another yellow moon has punched a hole in the nighttime,” “The downtown trains are full/With all those Brooklyn girls/They try so hard to break out of their little worlds,” and “you wave your hands and they scatter like crows” ring of Ira Gershwin and Cole Porter. The song is a perfect modern pop structure, somewhat rare for Waits in this era when he was moving away from the folk-jazz troubadour persona and a little more towards the avant-garde…. read more over @ allmusic.com
Lyrics:
Outside another yellow moon
Punched a hole in the nighttime, yes
I climb through the window and down the street
Shining like a new dime
The downtown trains are full
With all those Brooklyn girls
They try so hard to break out of their little worlds
You wave your hand and they scatter like crows
They have nothing that will ever capture your heart
They’re just thorns without the rose
Be careful of them in the dark
Oh if I was the one
You chose to be your only one
Oh baby can’t you hear me now
Chorus:
Will I see you tonight
On a downtown train
Every night its just the same
You leave me lonely, now
I know your window and I know its late
I know your stairs and your doorway
I walk down your street and past your gate
I stand by the light at the four way
You watch them as they fall
They stay at the carnival
But they’ll never win you back
Chorus:
Will I see you tonight
On a downtown train
Where every night its just the same
You leave me lonely
Will I see you tonight
On a downtown train
All of my dreams just fall like rain
All upon a downtown train
Bone Machine marked a return to studio material for Waits, coming a full five years after his previous studio album, Franks Wild Years (1987). The album is often noted for its dark lyrical themes of death and murder, and for its rough, stripped-down, percussion-heavy blues rock style.
Recording & production:
Bone Machine was recorded and produced entirely at the Prairie Sun Recording studios in Cotati, California in a room of Studio C known as “the Waits Room,” in the old cement hatchery rooms of the cellar of the buildings.
Mark “Mooka” Rennick, Prairie Sun studio chief said:
[Waits] gravitated toward these “echo” rooms and created the Bone Machine aural landscape. […] What we like about Tom is that he is a musicologist. And he has a tremendous ear. His talent is a national treasure.
Waits said of the bare-bones studio, “I found a great room to work in, it’s just a cement floor and a hot water heater. Okay, we’ll do it here. It’s got some good echo.” References to the recording environment and process were made in the field-recorded interview segments made for the promotional CD release, Bone Machine: The Operator’s Manual, which threaded together full studio tracks and conversation for a pre-recorded radio show format.
Artwork:
The cover photo, which consists of a blurred black-and-white, close-up image of Waits in a leather skullcap with horns and protective goggles, was taken by Jesse Dylan, the son of Bob Dylan.He wears this same outfit in the video for “Goin’ Out West” and “I Don’t Wanna Grow up”.
