Tom Waits - Shore Leave Lyrics

i was raised on Tom Waits....at age 5 i knew the words (or at least close enough to pass) to this song. and everytime I hear it i think of my childhood. EVERYONE I have ever played waits for ends up falling in love with at least 1 song...and then the rest of the songs make sense to them. Mount Rushmore of music better have this man on it.

Some guy on Grindr sent me here

Le véritable miracle de la rose, feu et aromes nos transcéndent…

I asked a school friend to buy this album for me for a birthday. I still have the LP.

.......Xmax 2019 corner stone of shore leave clarity... without question without equal!

If Hell exists & they let me listen to one LP forever

What the fuck did he leave his papers on? Dives me crazy.

"and I said Baby, I'm so far away from home
and I miss my Baby so
I can't make it by myself
I love you so"

"and I said Baby, I'm so far away from home
and I miss my Baby so
I can't make it by myself
I love you so"

You listen to this album so much as a whole that it somehow almost overshadows how spectacular the individual songs are.

I left all my papers on Taaaiiiconddeeerooooga

Tom Waits one of America's greatest Painters .

I OPEN MY HEART AND LET IT AND MY MIND INTERPRETED THE PATH TO THAT MOST BEAUTIFUL 'ME' THAT IS I ;THE SOUL;
I FIND SPIRITU SANCTU IN MUSIC IN CHANCE IN A SMILE,AND LIFE'S ENDLESS DANCE THAT GOES WELL BEYOND THE GRAVE;DEATH IS A DOORWAY

who are the other two on the cover ???

are you really going to tell me that THIS has been clicked as ridiculously much as 200.000 times in NINE YEARS? in case someone was lacking the final proof that things are going terribly wrong - this should convince even the greatest sceptic!

I had similar responce to these click numbers

Well with buck shot eyes and a purple heart
I rolled down the national stroll
and with a big fat paycheck
strapped to my hip sack
and a shore leave wristwatch underneath
my sleeve
in a Hong Kong drizzle on Cuban heels
I rowed down the gutter to the Blood Bank
and I'd left all my papers on the Ticonderoga
and was in a bad need of a shave
and so I slopped at the corner on cold chow mein
and shot billards with a midget
until the rain stopped
and I bought a long sleeved shirt
with horses on the front
and some gum and a lighter and a knife
and a new deck of cards (with girls on the back)
and I sat down and wrote a letter to my wife

and I said Baby, I'm so far away from home
and I miss my Baby so
I can't make it by myself
I love you so

Well I was pacing myself
trying to make it all last
squeezing all the life
out of a lousy two day pass
and I had a cold one at the Dragon
with some Filipino floor show
and talked baseball with a lieutenant
over a Singapore sling
and I wondered how the same moon outside
over this Chinatown fair
could look down on Illinois
and find you there
and you know I love you Baby

and I'm so far away from home
and I miss my Baby so
I can't make it by myself
I love you so

Shore Leave...
Shore Leave...

Blind boy brought me to this dark corner of the web, thankful he did. Yurt.

Have an original of this vinyl 33...A dealer offered £30....he gone ! A hipster offered £45 he gone worse ( with a little-bitta-help..no-one gonna find HIM)...I'll take £45 + P&P...

Swomtrorts and fishbone
Boneswords and tromfish
Dishes
Trombones afterwards.
Fish and sword bones.
We grow them.
On mice.
Come, come,
To Candyland!
The university of insanity,
Awaits your expertise.

One of my favorite all time Tom Waits songs. I could listen to this 20 times in a row and find something new in it each time ! So many moving parts to this song. Love it !

True. As the cover in Wicked Grin with Hammond also

Shoreleave...whoa. ..
Way too fine. ...

i love it, thanks

"And I was in a bad need of a shave" me too, until yesterday

Had my first Singapore Sling tonight, maybe if I'd been talking baseball with a lieutenant I'd have enjoyed it more

zenshinzenrei did you slip at the corner on cold chow main and shoot billiards with a midget until the rain stopped? If not, you ain't never lived.

every weekend I think "trying to squeeze all the life I can out of a lousy two day pass"

Well with buck shot eyes and a purple heart
I rolled down the national stroll
and with a big fat paycheck
strapped to my hip sack
and a shore leave wristwatch underneath
my sleeve
in a Hong Kong drizzle on Cuban heels
I rowed down the gutter to the Blood Bank
and I'd left all my papers on the Ticonderoga
and was in a bad need of a shave
and so I slopped at the corner on cold chow mein
and shot billards with a midget
until the rain stopped
and I bought a long sleeved shirt
with horses on the front
and some gum and a lighter and a knife
and a new deck of cards (with girls on the back)
and I sat down and wrote a letter to my wife

and I said Baby, I'm so far away from home
and I miss my Baby so
I can't make it by myself
I love you so

Well I was pacing myself
trying to make it all last
squeezing all the life
out of a lousy two day pass
and I had a cold one at the Dragon
with some Filipino floor show
and talked baseball with a lieutenant
over a Singapore sling
and I wondered how the same moon outside
over this Chinatown fair
could look down on Illinois
and find you there
and you know I love you Baby

and I'm so far away from home
and I miss my Baby so
I can't make it by myself
I love you so

Shore Leave...
Shore Leave...

Песня моей молодости

What do people who don't know this, think when they look at the moon?

Cheese.

I'm actually in Illinois, so . . . I think of men on shore leave.

Shirley.... Shirrrleyyy, shiiiirley, shirrleyyy shirleyyyyy, Shirley!

ChannelTonto I think he's saying "shore leave", which is the name of the track.

I hear “Charlie” especially in the live version.

could this have been partly inspired by sun ra's 'India' by chance??

Am I the only one who got brought here by "Under Grand Hotel" ?

Love this song, can't tell you how many times I listened to this in China, Taiwan, Hong Kong or Japan, Tom nailed the Asia ennui accompanied by some booze - wrote lots of letters listening to this.

hearing this in Myanmar ghost town Nay Pyi Daw was so surreal

Should shave seen him in new Orleans

what is this instrument called?

+moonwalker4696 which one? The one prominent in the chorus is a marimba

It is a mirimbula.A wooden,but bigger,than a zylaphone.

you're not allowed to write in first person -- when that person is in the navy... when you, as an artist, has not been in the navy.... though.... being that he's tom waits...maybe he's allowed. he certain did leave it all out there.

Sun Ra that you can light !!!

I listened to this album my first time taking shrooms. It was, uh, interesting.

Tom on shrooms ? I'd rather save mine for floyd.

Tell us more!!! :)

Simple blues once again re imagined, i for the life of me cant understand why he has an unattainable feel to the majority. If a movie takes you on a ride youve been on timlessly before like star wars, yet you dont feel like its the same old tired ride..........

I once played this to my brother and his friends while on a car trip. They just looked at me like I was from another planet.

I grew up with this being played by my father on long car trips. Tom Waits, Bob Dylan, and cigarette smoke, in a forest green 70's Volvo station wagon.

*Sweet*Shine* your dad was cool!

Yer brother ain't gotta clue

Did you tell them the appropriate response is actually "Thank you"?

you ARE :D

What a wonderful artist, he paints with oil and words. Every song... every song is a wonderful, beautiful work of art. The scenes he places in my mind are vivid, intriguing and always entertaining. I've said it before, he's one of my favorites and if he's not one of yours... well... um... you're just wrong.

Lol yeah that's Tom

you have got that right !!

"Oil And Words" would make a great title for a Tom Waits album!

@ theReegar: " i love to play tom waits to people when i first meet them. this is an unbeatable test of intelligence and character"

You said it, brother; I don't know you, but feel I could. Brilliant.

i do the same thing with visitor q and gummo

@jed harper lmfao

As litmus tests go, that's a good one.

judging someone by their taste of music sounds like the dumbest thing in the world to me.

What makes this work for me is that beneath the avant-garde surface, this is basically a 12-bar blues.

Thats what makes it brilliant

It would be wise of you to deny ever having had this conversation.

..b-black wings? is that you?

I worked in a second hand record store once, and one late night a friend of mine came in and started looking through the boxes. He found the Swordfishtrombones vinyl for 5€ and I'd completely missed it.
I tried to talk him out of it so that I could get it myself, but he bought it. Needless to say I killed him with a guitar string and took it.

Used to play this during my time in Taiwan and Japan - 'some Filipino floor show' ha ha that just about sums it up.

Got this album for Christmas from a friend fresh out of prison, if that aint saying something.....

Just close your eyes and you are there!

One word : Genius .
Keep this way guys.

In Chinatown in KL, this song is just right :)

I have the blues now.... No have enough money for buy a bottle of hot whisky ...

fANTASTIC, YOU´RE VERY RIGHT, IF ONE DOES NOT APPRECIATE TOM´S MUSIC, SONMERTHING THERE MUST BE WRONG.

True story

Me to !!!!
I thought i was the only one!

There are thousands of use and we are all profoundly fucking weird and it's awesome!

I have this album and i need someone killed we should talk

i listen to this when i feel like piercing my soul, which turns out to be quite often.

I like the one from Big Time better.

my favourite too

@BenWright91 One of my first pickups when I started collecting. Swordfishtrombones and Rain Dogs are must haves in my opinion.

Beautiful Maladies by far one of his best compilations

Swordfishtrombones is definitely Tom Waits' masterpiece

@BenWright91 i have the big time album and no "shore leave" on it. how come?

@TheReegar Yes! if you don't get it, GET OUTTA MY HOUSE! HAhaha nice

@jeanmariefagon because he is the greatest American songwriter of the second half of the 20th century. If it wasn't for George Gershwin, it would have been the whole century.

this, the title track, Frank's Wild Years-such magnificent pieces of art. tom waits is the man.

He transports me into a different personality, time and place!!!

One hell of a song Prob my fav on swordfishtrombones

God that's cool!!!

Un piccolo capolavoro ;)

my favourite track on the album - i still have it on 2nd hand vinyl, £2.99 from Beano's record store in croydon, suitably dog eared but unscratched (ha ha ) , bought in maybe, 91/92....

To personeel o o o what we all know