The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me) (An Evening with Pete King)

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"The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me)"
Song by Tom Waits
from the album Small Change
ReleasedOctober 1976
Length3:37
Label Asylum
Songwriter(s) Tom Waits
Producer(s) Bones Howe

"The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me) (An Evening with Pete King)", often referred to as "The Piano Has Been Drinking", is a song written and performed by Tom Waits. The song first appeared on his 1976 album Small Change , and an extended live version on the 1981 compilation album Bounced Checks .

Contents

Lyrics

Throughout the song, Waits imitates a drunkard, spouting nonsense phrases with the piano tune occasionally stumbling over itself, recalling a "somewhat abused, slightly-out-of-tune piano that one would expect to find in the corner of a bar or left out in the rain." [1] Waits repeatedly comments and complains about numerous inanimate objects with such lyrics as "The carpet needs a haircut." The song has been described as "[inhabiting] that late-night hades, the club where you can't find a waitress, 'even with a Geiger counter'; where 'the spotlight looks like a prison break' and the owner has 'the IQ of a fence post.'" [2] The song's full title includes a reference to Pete King, co-founder and club director of Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club, at which Waits performed from May 31 to June 12, 1976. [3]

Live performances

In the mid-1970s, Waits occasionally performed the song as a medley with "Makin' Whoopee." [3] Waits performed the song, in truncated form, on the short-lived US television show, Fernwood 2 Night in 1977, during the promotion for Small Change. The appearance also included a short skit in interview form, premised on a broken-down tour bus, during which Waits asks to borrow money from hosts Martin Mull and Fred Willard. [4] [5] Waits performed an extended version of the song in Dublin in March, 1981, which appeared on the 1981 compilation Bounced Checks. [3]

Reception

Patrick Humphries, in his book The Many Lives of Tom Waits, believed "The Piano Has Been Drinking" to be "the archetypal Waits song: the laconic bar-room philosopher delivering pithy lyrics, in a voice that sounds like a garbage crusher." [2] Bill Janovitz, writing for Allmusic, wrote that the song "deflates the myth that there is glory in a life on the road, the darker reality of Kerouac's romanticizing, but it does so without being didactic or even very serious." [6] The song has twice been covered by Dan Hicks & His Hot Licks, for his albums Beatin' The Heat (2000) and Alive & Lickin' (2001). [3]

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References

  1. ↑ Kessel, Corinne (2007) The words and music of Tom Waits, Praeger, p23
  2. 1 2 Humphries, Patrick (2007) The many lives of Tom Waits, Omnibus Press, pp. 92–93.
  3. 1 2 3 4 "The Piano Has Been Drinking" lyrics - Tom Waits Library - accessed February 19, 2021
  4. ↑ IMDb - Season_01, episode_21 - aired 1977-August-01st
  5. ↑ youTube - Tom Waits - the Piano Has Been Drinking - 1977
  6. ↑ "The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me)" review - Allmusic review by Bill Janovitz - accessed November 14, 2010
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