Downtown Train, Hold On



Tom Waits: Downtown Train. A video from 1985 for all of us who ride the trains into Tokyo on occasion. No car? Welcome to the future. The days of SUVs and zero percent financing and huge Hummers are over. So over. "They try so hard to break out of their little worlds."


And here is Hold On, beautiful video, beautiful song. And here is some fun trivia from Wikipedia:

Waits has steadfastly refused to allow the use of his songs in commercials and has joked about other artists who do. ("If Michael Jackson wants to work for Pepsi, why doesn't he just get himself a suit and an office in their headquarters and be done with it?") He has filed several lawsuits against advertisers who used his material without permission. He has been quoted as saying, "Apparently, the highest compliment our culture grants artists nowadays is to be in an ad — ideally, naked and purring on the hood of a new car," he said in a statement, referring to the Mercury Cougar. "I have adamantly and repeatedly refused this dubious honor."

Comments

Tom O said…
What if you were an unknown artist and were then offered a LOT of money to use one track? Money that could then be ploughed back to produce (pun intended) even bigger and better music. Then there's the perfect answer - soundtracks.

Bladerunner - Van Gelis, definitely my ichiban-ski soundtrack. How about others?

'Trains Into Tokyo' - now, would this be a good song name, band name, album no namae??
6:16 am, December 31, 2008
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