CD, стоящие на полке рядом : Pop (Ballads)      

Recorded July, Aug 1978

Two welcome changes in style made Blue Valentine a fresh listening experience for Tom Waits fans. First, Waits had altered the instrumentation, bringing in electric guitar and keyboards and largely dispensing with the strings for a more blues-oriented, hard-edged sound. Second, though his worldview remained fixed on the lowlifes of the late night, he had expanded beyond the musings of the barstool philosopher who previously had acted as the first-person character of most of his songs. When Waits did use the "I," it was to write a "Christmas Card from a Hooker in Minneapolis," not the figure most listeners had associated with the singer himself. The result was a broadening of subject matter, a narrative discipline that made most of the tunes story songs, and a coherent framing for Waits' typically colorful and intriguing imagery. These were not radical reinventions, but Waits had followed such a rigidly stylized approach on his previous albums that for anyone who had followed him so far, the course correction was big news.

All Music Guide