Waits, Tom (Thomas Alan)

US singer, songwriter, musician, and actor, with a characteristic gravelly voice. His songs typically deal with urban street life and have jazz-tinged arrangements, as on Rain Dogs (1985). He has written music for and acted in several films, including Jim Jarmusch's Down by Law (1986).

Waits developed a beatnik hobo persona on his early albums (Closing Time (1973), Nighthawks at the Diner (1976), Small Change (1977)) with songs like ‘The Piano Has Been Drinking’ and ‘Tom Traubert's Blues’. His later work has a spare, twisted jazz feel and suggests the influence of German songwriter Kurt Weill; for example, Swordfishtrombones (1983), Bone Machine (1992), and Mule Variations (1999). As an actor, his films include Francis Ford Coppola's One from the Heart (1982), Ironweed (1987), and Short Cuts (1993).