black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

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.

Tom Waits

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.
TOM WAITS

Drowning Music Rescue Sound Time Yourself
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.
TOM WAITS

Floor Machine Myself Pieces
A gentleman is someone who can play the accordion, but doesn’t.
TOM WAITS

Gentle Man Play
It’s rather mystifying when you think about writing songs – where they come from, and how they’re born.
TOM WAITS

Born Mysterious Thinking Writing Yourself
I do some acting. And there’s a difference between “I do some acting” and “I’m an actor.”
TOM WAITS

Act Actor Difference Myself
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.
TOM WAITS

Appreciation Greatness Music Myself Vocabulary
If I exorcise my devils, all my angels may go, too.
TOM WAITS

Angel Devil Myself
I’ll take a rusty nail and scratch your initials on my arm.
TOM WAITS

Initial Myself Scratch
Never trust a man in a blue trench coat, never drive a car when you’re dead.
TOM WAITS

Death Drive Man Trust Yourself
Got a head full of lightning, a hat full of rain.
TOM WAITS

Head Rain
Songs are really just very interesting things to be doing with the air.
TOM WAITS

Air Interest Song
On my gravestone, I want it to say, “I told you I was sick.”
TOM WAITS

Funny Grave Myself Sick
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.
TOM WAITS

Fight Justice Myself World
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.
TOM WAITS

Ideas Insect Lying Myself See
But it’s so hard to dance that way when it’s cold and there’s no music.
TOM WAITS

Cold Dance Hard Music Way
I’ve been riding on the crest of a slump lately.
TOM WAITS

Late Myself Ride

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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Tom Waits Quotes