Tom waits quotes

A gentleman is someone who can play the accordion, but doesn't.

I never told the truth so i can never tell a lie.

You know what I really love? The CD players in a car. How when you put the CD right up by the slot, it actually takes it out of your hand, like it's hungry. It pulls it in, and you feel like it wants more silver discs.

We are all just monkeys with money and guns.

On my gravestone, I want it to say, "I told you I was sick."

You learn as much from your kids as they learn from you.

There's nothing that makes me laugh more than being in the situation where you're not supposed to laugh. Funerals. People crying. Breaking down. Telling you their life. I'm the worst. I'm the worst at that.

The average person spends two weeks over their lifetime waiting for the traffic light to change.

Once upon a time there was a crooked tree and a straight tree. And they grew next to each other. And every day the straight tree would look at the crooked tree and he would say, "You're crooked. You've always been crooked and you'll continue to be crooked. But look at me! Look at me!" said the straight tree. He said, "I'm tall and I'm straight." And then one day the lumberjacks came into the forest and looked around, and the manager in charge said, "Cut all the straight trees." And that crooked tree is still there to this day, growing strong and growing strange.

Songs are really just very interesting things to be doing with the air.

I like beautiful melodies telling me terrible things.

You can learn a lot about a woman by getting smashed with her.

I'll take a rusty nail and scratch your initials on my arm.

Got a head full of lightning, a hat full of rain.

Don't plant your bad days. They grow into weeks. The weeks grow into months. Before you know it, you got yourself a bad year. Take it from me - choke those little bad days. Choke 'em down to nothing.

I made a wish on a sliver of moonlight A sly grin and a bowl full of stars

The trick is to have a career and have a family. It's like having two dogs that hate each other and you have to take them for a walk every night.

Most of the things you absorb you will ultimately secrete.

Writing songs is like capturing birds without killing them. Sometimes you end up with nothing but a mouthful of feathers.

For a songwriter, you don't really go to songwriting school; you learn by listening to tunes. And you try to understand them and take them apart and see what they're made of, and wonder if you can make one, too.

The way you do anything is the way you do everything.

I've been riding on the crest of a slump lately.

Don't you know there ain't no devil, it's just god when he's drunk.

New York forces you to be in endless surreal situations.

They say that I have no hits and that I'm difficult to work with. And they say that like it's a bad thing.

She's a shiksa goddess and a trapeze artist, all of that. She can fix the truck...she's outta this world...she's bold, inventive and fearless. That's who you wanna go in the woods with, right? Somebody who finishes your sentences for you.

You can drive out nature with a pitch fork But it always comes roaring back again.

Every single song has its own individual character and you can't treat each song the same way, because it wants to be treated differently and there are songs that are like scared birds that you have to sneak up on over the course of months in the woods.

A mental midget with the IQ of a fence post.

I danced along a colored wind/ Dangled from a rope of sand

I always thought songs are movies for the ears and films are like songs for the eyes.

You cannot really be too concerned with what people think of you. You're on your own adventure of growth and discovery. So it's not always good to be who people think you are, especially if you subscribe to it as well ... which is easily done, because then you don't have to figure out who you are, you just ask somebody else.

The devil knows the Bible like the back of his hand...

All the donuts have names that sound like prostitutes

It's rather mystifying when you think about writing songs - where they come from, and how they're born.

I put food on the table and roof overhead. But I'd trade it all tomorrow for the highway instead.

Never have your wallet with you onstage. It's bad luck. You shouldn't play the piano with money in your pocket. Play like you need the money.

I’ve always been a word guy, I like weird words and I like American slang and all that and words that are no longer being used… I like to drag them out of the box and wave them around… this is an interesting one, it’s amazing how in addition to punctuation just a little pause in the wrong place can just completely transform the meaning of something.

If there's one thing you can say about mankind, there's nothing kind about man.

If you get far enough away you'll be on your way back home.

Did the devil make the world while God was sleeping?

There's a beauty of show business. It's the only business you can have a career in when you're dead.

Living with kids is like living with a bunch of drunks. You know you really have to be on your toes all the time. Things are falling over and breaking and spilling. If you live on the second story, you really have to keep the windows shut all the time.

I'm the type of guy who'd sell you a rat's asshole for a wedding ring.

I started out with nothing and I still got most of it left.

You're my North Star when I'm lost and feeling blue.

I'm always looking for sounds that are pleasing at the time. The sound of a helicopter is really annoying until you're drowning, and it's there to rescue you. Then it sounds like music.

I think all songs should have weather in them. Names of towns and streets, and they should have a couple of sailors. I think those are just song prerequisites.

Well, it's either kiss me or kill me, that's how I see it.

Their memory's like a train: you can see it getting smaller as it pulls away And the things you can't remember Tell the things you can't forget that History puts a saint in every dream.

I just don't like the word 'fun'--it's like Volkswagen, or bell-bottoms, or patchouli-oil or bean-sprouts...it rubs me up the wrong way.

There’s nothing more embarrassing than a person who tries to guess what the great American public would like, makes a compromise for the first time, and falls flat on his face… I would rather be a failure on my own terms than a success on someone else’s. That’s a difficult statement to live up to, but then I’ve always believed that the way you affect your audience is more important than how many of them are there.

I don't have a drinking problem 'Cept when I can't get a drink.

Mostly I straddle reality and the imagination. My reality needs imagination like a bulb needs a socket. My imagination needs reality like a blind man needs a cane.

The big print giveth and the small print taketh away.

Everything is explained now. We live in an age when you say casually to somebody 'What's the story on that?' and they can run to the computer and tell you within five seconds. That's fine, but sometimes I’d just as soon continue wondering. We have a deficit of wonder right now.

All that you've loved is all you own

Not the kind of wheel you fall asleep at.

If I exorcise my devils, all my angels may go, too.

I did my time in the jail of your arms

She's got the whole dark forest living inside of her.

The fact is most of the things that people know about me are made up. My own life is backstage. So what you "know" about me is only what I allowed you to know about me.

Children make up the best songs, anyway. Better than grown-ups. Kids are always working on songs and throwing them away, like little origami things or paper airplanes. They don't care if they lose it; they'll just make another one.

I admit that I ain't no angel, I admit that I ain't no saint - I'm selfish and I'm cruel and I'm blind. If I exorcise my devils, well my angels may leave too. When they leave they're so hard to find.

Champagne for my real friends and real pain for my sham friends.

There's always free cheddar in the mousetrap, baby.

I'm not fighting for justice. I am not fighting for freedom. I am fighting for my life and another day in the world here.

Jimmy Stewart said he stopped making movies because he didn't like the way he looked on screen anymore. I'm more the guy who says I look like hell but I'm going to see where it gets me.

I like Thelonious Monk, he's so gnarled, he's like a piece of machinery that's pulled up the bolts on the floor and gone off on its own.

The Universe is making music all the time.

I always liked the idea that America is a big facade. We are all insects crawling across on the shiny hood of a Cadillac. We're all looking at the wrapping. But we won't tear the wrapping to see what lies beneath.

When you're writing‚ you're conjuring. It's a ritual‚ and you need to be brave and respectful and sometimes get out of the way of whatever it is that you're inviting into the room.

I like vocal word stuff. But I don't always write with an instrument, I usually write a capella. It's more like drawing in the air with your fingers. It's closest to the choreography of a bee. You're freer.

And the earth died screaming, while I lay dreaming.

Sing me a rainbow. Steal me a dream.

I can't listen to so much music at the same time. I think you really have to have a diet. You're just processing too much, there's no place to put it. If you go a long time without hearing music, then you hear music that nobody else hears.

I've lost my equilibrium, my car keys, and my pride.

When I was younger, I wanted to be older. Now I am older, I am not quite so sure.

If people are a little nervous about approaching you at the market, it's good. I'm not Chuckles The Clown. Or Bozo. I don't cut the ribbon at the opening of markets. I don't stand next to the mayor. Hit your baseball into my yard, and you'll never see it again.

I like turning on two radios at once. I like hearing things wrong… I get a lot of ideas by mishearing things.

Oh, I'm not a percussionist, I just like to hit things.

We are buried beneath the weight of information, which is being confused with knowledge; quantity is being confused with abundance and wealth with happiness. We are monkeys with money and guns.

The blues is like a planet. It's an enormous topic. You can't ignore the impact that it has had and continues to have on the whole musical culture. It's a tree that everyone is swinging from. Without it, I don't know where I would be. It's indelible and indispensable.

Never trust a man in a blue trench coat, never drive a car when you're dead

I guess I've always lived upside down when I want things I can't have. My wife actually thinks I have a syndrome called Reality Distortion Field. It's kind of like drugs, only you can't come back from it. Reality Distortion is almost a permanent condition. Things come in and they go out: Presto, chango! To a certain extent, I did that with myself. As a kid, I did want to be an old-timer, since they were the ones with the big stories and the cool clothes. I wanted to go there. Now, I guess I want to bring that with me and go back in time.

We have a deficit of wonder right now.

Come down off the cross, we could use the wood.

The beginning of it starts at the end

The folks who know the truth aren't talking.... The ones who don't have a clue, you can't shut them up!

You got to tell me the brave captain Why are the wicked so strong? How do the angels get to sleep When the devil leaves the porch light on?

I've never been a fan of personality-conflict burgers and identity-crisis omelets with patchouli oil. I function very well on a diet that consists of Chicken Catastrophe and Eggs Overwhelming and a tall, cool Janitor-in-a-Drum. I like to walk out of a restaurant with enough gas to open a Mobil station.

it ain't no sin, to take off your skin and dance around in your bones

I don't think that you should be per­fectly candid and frank about the intimate details of your personal life with the public at large. Subsequently, it creates consider­able personal problems.

They have removed the struggle to find anything. And therefore there is no genuine sense of discovery. Struggle is the first thing we know getting along the birth canal, out in the world. It's pretty basic. Book store owners and record store owners used to be oracles, in that way; you'd go in this dusty old place and they might point you toward something that would change your life. All that's gone.

slept all night in the cedar grove, i was born to ramble, born to rove, some men are searchin' for the holy grail, but there ain't nothin' sweeter than ridin' the rails

The ocean doesn't want me today, But I'll come back tomorrow to play. The riptide is waging And the life guard's away But the ocean doesn't want me today

Most people don't care if you're telling them the truth or if you're telling them a lie, as long as they're entertained by it.

I’ve always believed that the way you affect your audience is more important than how many of them are there.

We are buried beneath the weight of information, which is being confused with knowledge; quantity is being confused with abundance and wealth with happiness.

I like my music with the rinds and the seeds and pulp left in.

when your down on your luck and you've lost all your dreams theres nothing like a campfire and a can of beans

Well I got a bad liver and broken heart, yeah,I drunk me a river since you tore me apart

Don't plant your days they turn into weeds

Most of the people I admire, they usually smell funny and don't get out much. It's true. Most of them are either dead or not feeling well.

Time is just memory Mixed in with Desire.

It's very hard to stop doing things you're used to doing. You almost have to dismantle yourself and scatter it all around and then put a blindfold on and put it back together so that you avoid old habits.

This is about all the bad days in the world. I used to have some little bad days, and I kept them in a little box. And one day, I threw them out into the yard. "Oh, it's just a couple little innocent bad days." Well, we had a big rain. I don't know what it was growing in but I think we used to put eggshells out there and coffee grounds, too. Don't plant your bad days. They grow into weeks. The weeks grow into months. Before you know it you got yourself a bad year. Take it from me. Choke those little bad days. Choke 'em down to nothin'. They're your days. Choke 'em!

I sold a quart of blood and bought a half a pint of scotch

The world is a hellish place, and bad writing is destroying the quality of our suffering.

Don't look back, because someone might be gaining on you.

I saw a crow building a nest, I was watching him very carefully, I was kind of stalking him and he was aware of it. And you know what they do when they become aware of someone stalking them when they build a nest, which is a very vulnerable place to be? They build a decoy nest. It's just for you.

Well you say that it's gospel, But I know that it's only church.

I'd rather have a free bottle in front of me than a prefrontal lobotomy.

I hate Disneyland. It primes our kids for Las Vegas.

You have to keep busy. After all, no dog's ever pissed on a moving car.

I'll tell you all my secrets but I lie about my past.

If you can make a little painting for the ears with a few words, well, I like words; I like cutting them up and finding different ways of saying the same thing... I get into a spell, and it all comes easy. I don't labor over it. I go inside the song, I think you make yourself an antenna for songs, and songs want to be around you. And then they bring other songs along, and then they're all sitting around, and they're drinkin' your beer, and they're sleeping on the floor. And they are using the phone, they're rude, thankless little f---ers.

I'm so horny the crack of dawn better watch out.

I'm just trying to make a buck like everyone else.

There's no prayer like desire.

I don't like the stigma that comes with being called a poet . . . So I call what I'm doing an improvisational adventure or an inebriational travelogue.

I always had a great appreciation for jazz, but I'm a very pedestrian musician. I get by. I like to think that my main instrument is vocabulary.

My wife called me a mule. She once said, "I didn't marry a man; I married a mule!" I kept thinking about it. It was in the back of my head. I think it makes a good title for an album.

I'm interested in things when I don't know what they are. Like "Hey, Ray, what the hell is this?" Oh, that's lipstick from the 1700s, that's dog food from the turn of the century, that's a hat from World War II. I'm interested in the minutiae of things. Oddities.

You're innocent when you dream.