Fifty years ago a young and aspiring Tom Waits released The Heart of Saturday Night, his attempt to immerse himself in the romance of longing for adventure, trouble, mystery of love and lust, and the after- hours clubs where jazz, blues, lounge, piano bar crooners would gather and play for and with each other in their search for the ruby eye of the heart that only shone on a Saturday night.
He imagined a concept album with a small bebop jazz ensemble, filled with the literary influences of the two Jacks – Kerouac and London – along with classic American songbook songwriters and the language and sound of the piano played in intimate clubs for and with musicians who had finished their regular Saturday night engagements. In searching for the voice for these characters, he evoked Sinatra’s ‘In the Wee Small Hours’ and was inspired to mold his fingers to the keyboard by the bold, improvisational and unique Thelonius Monk.
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