Real Gone (album)

Real Gone is the sixteenth studio album by Tom Waits, released October 4, 2004 in Europe, and October 5 in United States on the ANTI- label. The album was supported by the Real Gone Tour, playing sold out locations in North America and Europe in October and November 2004.

The album features some of the few political songs Waits has written, the most explicit being "Day After Tomorrow", a song Waits has described as an "elliptical" protest against the Iraq War.

It was chosen by the editors of Harp Magazine as the best album of 2004.

A remixed, remastered version of the album was released by ANTI- on November 22, 2017, with the remastering process personally overseen by Waits and Kathleen Brennan.

Background
Per ANTI-, "Written and produced by Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan, his wife and long-time collaborator, Real Gone features 15 tracks of funk, Jamaican rock-steady, blues both urban and rural, rhythms and melodies both Latin and African and, for the first time, no piano. The crash and collide of rhythms and genres within a song creates a hybrid unlike any music he has and the sonic mayhem and nonsense rhyme ride to 'Top of the Hill' are both punctuated by a live band and turntable playing along to Waits' home recorded voice percussion."

The album features Waits beatboxing on tracks like "Top of the Hill" and "Metropolitan Glide". He had picked up the technique from his interest in hip hop. Waits's longtime guitarist Marc Ribot plays in a Cuban style on "Hoist That Rag", as he had on The Prosthetic Cubans.

The album features references to real people and events. "Don't Go Into That Barn" was based on a New York Times story about a slave jail in Kentucky. The article quotes Isaac Lang, Jr.: "Dad told us never to go in there...He said, 'Boys, I'm going to tell you the truth. It's all right to play around that barn, but don't go inside.' He said it just wasn't right. That it was pitiful. He never did tell us why." The article quotes Carl Westmoreland: "It was a slave ship turned upside down," a line echoed by Waits.

Track listing

 * 1) "Top of the Hill" – 4:55
 * 2) "Hoist That Rag" – 4:20
 * 3) "Sins of My Father" – 10:36
 * 4) "Shake It" – 3:52
 * 5) "Don't Go into That Barn" – 5:22
 * 6) "How's It Gonna End" – 4:51
 * 7) "Metropolitan Glide" – 4:13
 * 8) "Dead and Lovely" – 5:40
 * 9) "Circus" – 3:56
 * 10) "Trampled Rose" – 3:58
 * 11) "Green Grass" – 3:13
 * 12) "Baby Gonna Leave Me" – 4:29
 * 13) "Clang Boom Steam" – 0:46
 * 14) "Make It Rain" – 3:39
 * 15) "Day After Tomorrow" – 6:56
 * 16) "Chick a Boom" – 1:17 (hidden track)

Personnel

 * Brain – percussion (tracks 1–5, 7, 10 and 12), claps (track 4)
 * Les Claypool – bass (tracks 2, 4 and 12)
 * Harry K. Cody – guitar (tracks 5 and 7), banjo (track 6)
 * Mark Howard – bells (track 9), claps (track 4)
 * Marc Ribot – guitar (tracks 1–4, 8, 11, 12, 14 and 15), banjo (track 3), cigar box banjo (track 10)
 * Larry Taylor – bass (tracks 1, 3, 5–8, 10–12, 14 and 15), guitar (tracks 4 and 5)
 * Casey Waits – drums (tracks 8, 9 and 14), turntables (tracks 1 and 7), percussion (tracks 2 and 5), claps (track 4)
 * Tom Waits – vocals, guitar (tracks 3, 6, 7, 11 and 15), chamberlin (track 9), percussion (track 5), shakers (track 12), beatboxing (tracks 1, 7, 12, 13 and 16)
 * Trisha Wilson – claps (track 4)