Alice

Description

Alice is one of the most distinctive of all Waits creations, occupying its own corner in the odd-angled room that is Tom Waits body of work and while there are the familiar partsthe redoubtable ragged voice, jazz ballads and poignant musings on death and longingthe whole is strange and exotic.

A devastatingly beautiful atmosphere made of sorrow and reverie, insanity and resignation, rises like a mist in Alice. Its a lyrical melancholia, a feeling that creeps in on the arms of Stroh violins and unabashed poetry. These are songs to fall into, and sometimes, to keep falling. There are fragile, haunted musings, and laments, mad ruminations, and tales of unrequited love and anthems from beyond the grave.

Alice is the eighteenth studio album from Tom Waits, and follows on from 1999s Mule Variations. Originally written in 1992 for an opera which was based loosely on Lewis Carrolls obsession with the girl who inspired Alice In Wonderland. Working with long term collaborator Kathleen Brennan, it fuses the familiar sound of Tom Waits, melancholic jazz and piano bar blues, with an avant-garde orchestra, which sets this album apart from his previous work.