Photo: Corio/Retna

Born December 7th, 1949 Key Tracks "New Coat of Paint," "Downtown Train," "Dirt in the Ground" Influenced Nick Cave, James Hetfield, Isaac Brock (Modest Mouse)

Tom Waits' voice "has the smoothness of Barry White, but the raspiness of a mountain lion," says hip-hop producer RZA. The "smoothness" may be hard to believe, but on early solo LPs like 1973's Closing Time and 1974's The Heart of Saturday Night, Waits was more like Hoagy Carmichael than a wild animal, with a jazzy croon lightly covered in gravel. But as Waits' songs got darker and weirder — more dada than doo-be-doo — on albums like 1985's Rain Dogs and 1992's Bone Machine, so did his singing. It is now one of the most dramatic instruments in pop, a deep, pitted bark — part carnival hustler, part crackling furnace. Waits can still sell a ballad, too, like the haunting "House Where Nobody Lives," on 1999's Mule Variations. "He has a little bit of James Brown," says Rickie Lee Jones. "And a whole lot of Louis Armstrong."

1. New Coat of Paint
2. Downtown Train
3. Dirt in the Ground
4. Jockey Full of Bourbon
5. Goin' Out West
6. Cold Cold Ground
7. Clap Hands
8. Hang on St. Christopher
9. Diamonds on my Windshield
10. 16 Shells From a Thirty-Ought Six

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