With Understanding Comes Appreciation
The first time I listened to Tom Waits, which was randomly from a radio station btw, I thought that I had missed a song or an album made by one of my fav artists of all-time; the peerless, a blues belter straight out of the school of Howlin' Wolf, a cat who breathed and bathed in the free jazz of Eric Dolphy and Ornette Coleman, a painter and sculptor by nature, a rock and roll titan as leader and frontman; the one and only Captain Beefheart… and I said, wait (half drunk, half sober), this can’t be him, I mean, I know and have all made by the Captain.
Few days later (100% sober this time), I realized that I was correct; that song played by the radio station was the music of a fan, who is in fact one of the more, if not the most, influenced musicians by Don Van Vliet, Tom Waits; …and Oh boy! a new pleasant and eclectic door opened to me that day. BTW, the song played that day by the radio station was "Diamond and Gold" from his Rain Dogs album. The rest is history; I dug more, and instantly got hooked by his incredible music.