Green Grass

Sung from the prospect of being dead in his grave to a loved one. I love it. It's got whistling as well, what can't you like? And the opening line is brilliant.

cibelle covered this song on her album "the shine of dried electric leaves", and tom waits is on it too.

This song is really beautiful, though simple, and the lyrics are so poetic and sad. It really moves me everytime I listen to it. It talks about not wanting to be forgotten, though being dead, and not being able to let go of a loved one. In books and movies, we always hear that in the case of the death of a loved one, the dead would want us to move on, forget and be happy, but I think that song is actually more accurate. Though it might seem selfish, as humans, it's normal not to want to be forgotten by someone we love and not to want to be replaced. Well, at least, that's what I think.

This song makes me cry every time. If a song can do that to me, it is brilliant. This is what music/art is about. Being able to move someone and have them feel what the singer is feeling and I love Tom Waits because in such a short time he has managed to do this for me. He is an inspiration.

There isn't a better lyric than "Lay your head where my heart used to be." Heartrending, breathtaking, powerful, emotional, detached...just. Badass. Honestly. This song blew me away.

Tom Waits is the only singer/band/artist who I can just sit and listen to and not do ANYTHING else. Like I love sitting and listening to music, but I almost always want to chat with someone or read, browse the internet, whatever. With Tom, I can just turn it all off and be taken away by his amazingness.

Plus...this song has a god damn whistling solo.

A+.

Listening to this song right now and it's literally giving me goosebumps. Tom Waits is the greatest American songwriter ever, imo.

"Whistle 'Didn't He Ramble'": A traditional New Orleans funeral song, played as the procession returned from the burial site. "(Oh) Didn't He Ramble", by H. Bolton (Recorded by Louis Armstrong with his All Stars on April 26, 1950, and again in 1956): "Didn't he ramble.... he rambled Rambled all around.... in and out of town Didn't he ramble....didn't he ramble He rambled till the butcher cut him down His feet was in the market place..his head was in the street Lady pass him by, said..look at the market meat He grabbed her pocket book..and said I wish you well She pulled out a forty-five..said I'm head of personnel Didn't he ramble...I said he rambled Rambled all around...in and out of town Didn't he ramble...oh didn't he ramble He rambled till the butcher shot him down (instrumental break) He slipped into the cat house..made love to the stable Madam caught him cold..said I'll pay you when I be able Six months had passed ..and she stood all she could stand She said buddy when I'm through with you Ole groundhog gonna be shakin yo' hand And didn't he ramble...he rambled Rambled all around...in and out of town Oh didn't he ramble......he rambled You know he rambled...till the butcher...cut him down I said he rambled..lord...'till the butcher shot him down."

"Describe the sky to me": Notice this is sung from the grave.

"We'll catch mocking birds": The quote from Harper Lee's novel of racial injustice in a small Southern town goes: "Atticus said to Jem one day, 'I'd rather you shoot at tin cans in the back yard, but I know you'll go after birds. Shoot all the blue jays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird.' That was the only time I ever heard Atticus say it was a sin to do something, and I asked Miss Maudie about it. 'Your father's right,' she said. 'Mockingbirds don't do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They don't eat up peoples gardens, don't nest in corncribs, they don't do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it's a sin to kill a mockingbird.'" (Source: "To Kill A Mockingbird", chapter 10. Harper Lee, 1960)

i really like this song :)

My words - we'll catch mocking birds

This song reminds me a lot of Danny Boy