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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed albums.
Real Gone
Generally favorable reviews
Based on 32 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 19 votes
Read user comments
Rate this album >
Album Info
Label: Epitaph
Release Date: 05 October 2004
Discs: 1 disc
Genre(s): Rock
Summary
Fans of his acclaimed 2002 pair of discs will have to settle for just one album this time out, co-produced by Waits with Kathleen Brennan. Marc Ribot and Les Claypool guest.
Also By This Artist: Alice Blood Money Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards
Also On The Web: Official Artist Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
E! Online
Slapping his knees, spitting and grunting, Waits makes the already raw blues sound of songs like "Metropolitan Glide" and "Trampled Rose" sound even more grizzled.
Read Full Review >Playlouder
In ‘Real Gone’s fearsome complexity of rhythm, lyric and device, Tom Waits appropriates like a shoplifter without much time, and creates something entirely his own. A new music.
Read Full Review >Spin
Totally grimy. [Nov 2004, p.118]
Delusions of Adequacy
Real Gone is incredible because of its songs, some of which stand among Waits' finest work.
Read Full Review >Filter
Another smartly executed step into the strange grandeur of Mr. Waits. [#12, p.94]
Entertainment Weekly
Often riveting--and even a little gangsta. [8 Oct 2004, p.114]
cokemachineglow
Real Gone... is Waits’ grittiest work to date and is an excellent introduction, for those unacquainted, to his hard-boiled thirty-year run.
Read Full Review >The Wire
A set of powerfully written and unfussily executed songs. [#248, p.50]
Village Voice
The result is a kind of compactness: a guttural groove so tight it helps Waits come off as a giant.
Read Full Review >Dot Music
Reliably odd, then, but unexpectedly moving, too: the best Tom Waits album, all told, since 1992’s “Bone Machine”.
Read Full Review >Lost At Sea
When you boil Real Gone down to its tracks, you’ll keep finding more reasons to love this man – more than anything, you can sense his easy grin.
Read Full Review >Pitchfork
It lurches along like a junk-heap jalopy, unsteady and unsafe, bits flying off in every direction, stopping, starting, and bouncing in pain.
Read Full Review >Tiny Mix Tapes
All the idiosyncrasies which either drew you to Waits or repelled you from him are present, and many songs hold a resemblance to past gems.
Read Full Review >Splendid
Real Gone may not rock your world in the way that 2002's musical one-two punch of Blood Money and Alice did, but you'll still be glad to hear it.
Read Full Review >Mojo
His first, full-tilt protest record... he comes out swinging, in every respect. [Oct 2004, p.110]
PopMatters
Real Gone leans on nail-bending percussion and swagger in a manner that recalls Bone Machine's metallic binge more than the recent theatrics of Alice or Blood Money.
Read Full Review >Blender
Waits returns to spare storytelling. [Oct 2004, p.130]
Almost Cool
Overall, the album doesn't show quite the range that some of his previous works have done, but if you enjoy Waits, you're definitely not going to go wrong here.
Read Full Review >The New York Times
Like an altar built of barbed wire, scrap metal and broken glass, "Real Gone" hammers ungraceful materials into something like beauty.
Read Full Review >All Music Guide
Real Gone is another provocative moment for Waits, one that has problems, but then, all his records do.
Read Full Review >New Musical Express
'Real Gone' is not by any means easy listening. It is, though, possibly a new type of music. [2 Oct 2004, p.64]
Planet
A spastically raw and cacophonous basement record. [#8, p.79]
Dusted Magazine
Much of Real Gone has been stripped so bare instrumentally that its heavy accumulation of rhythmic noise -- manipulated groans and grunts (“Metropolitan Glide”) what sounds like a cracking horsewhip (“Don’t Go Into The Barn”) -- establishes a sustained, bristling mood that electrifies particular songs but bogs down the album as a whole.
Read Full Review >Stylus Magazine
A semi-bizarre and semi-wonderful example of twisted, melted country-blues-psyche-pop oddballness.
Read Full Review >ShakingThrough.net
A noisy, stamping, querulous assault on the senses that could have certainly benefited from more than a little editing.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club)
Real Gone is haunted-house music that invites listeners in for some shared uneasiness, but never lets them settle for long.
Read Full Review >Under The Radar
The album feels only like an extension of the Alice / Blood Money plateau, rather than a new height for the artist. [#7]
Rolling Stone
Waits retains his knack for recruiting world-class musicians... who can play like they're falling down the stairs of hell. [28 Oct 2004, p.98]
Uncut
Waits is still taking more risks than most US 'singer-songwriters' of his generation, and parts of this album rock righteously. It's just that some of Waits' musical modes... have been done before, and much better. By him. [Nov 2004, p.110]
Drowned In Sound
Tough going and very samey, both in sonics and lyricism. Even if you enjoy the basic template, you may well run out of steam before the end.
Read Full Review >Q Magazine
Some of the most awkward, unapproachable music he's made. [Nov 2004, p.128]
What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this album is 9.5 (out of 10) based on 19 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Hein gave it a10:
Forget all your fucked up 80s revival bands. This is the real sugar!!!
junior w gave it a 9:
Crackle boom, cough, thump, pop, pop, zoom, crackle and boom. Haroomph. Oooh, yeah, Haroomph. This album reclaims twaits honor after a few releases which seemed a bit cartoonish even for waits. The songs here are less about music and more about art. Waits has come to terms with his pallette and knows how to use it.
David M gave it a 9:
This album rocks. Very primitive load and aggressive sound. This is very raw, electric guitar sounding music., stripped down to the most purest form. One more thing, to all you people out their who think "CIRCUS" doesn't belong on this "ARE YOU STONED???" This is a friggin TOM WAITS CD !!! A CIRCUS RACONTEUR SONG BELONGS ON A TOM WAITS CD!!! C'MON PEOPLE!! THIS IS A GREAT POETIC RANT THAT UNCATEGORICALLY IS A THUMBPRINT OF TOM WAITS!!!!
ANDREW M gave it a 9:
Creeps up on you and bites you in the ass. This is Tom at his experimental best. If you loved Swordfishtrombones and Bone Machine, then this is for you. Toms dirty filthy rock root album ever.
Benjamin S gave it a 6:
Tom's strengths are in lyrics, songwriting, characterful singing and other forms of vocalizing, and aural atmospheres created in his music. On this album the lyrics are strong, the songwriting is more blues lines and gospel lines than melodic songs with a few exceptions, the characterful singing isn't close to the range of characters explored in previous recordings, and the aural atmospheres lack the surprises and depth of other releases. For the most part, this feels like Tom jamming rather than carefully crafting his music. Not his best effort, nowhere close to Alice, his most musically complex CD, or even in his Gospel/Folk/Coutry Blues does it range as far as Bone Machine or Mule Variations. Also, Circus doesn't belong on this recording. Just OK.
sophia star(israel) gave it a 10:
one more original, chaleging, smart, and highly beautifull albume for mr.waits to put in my collection! highly recomended to those who have their ears tuned up the right way!!
Paul S gave it a 10:
I'm always saddened by the fact that so many people feel a need to define and/or review an album based on previous releases. Comments like; "well, it's similar to Bone Machine, but..." or "Different from Alice and Blood Money, but..." I think this is because professional reviewers are somewhat unimaginative and it's easier to define by comparison than actually review the album on its own merit. Real Gone is a great album, truly one of the most unique listening experiences in years. Tom Waits maintains his title as "king-of-the-risk takers" by throwing everything up against the side of the barn and seeing what sticks. In this case, most of it does, in a beautiful, tragic and more than a little funny, way. This is a "screaming in the car" album if ever there was one. Enjoy it.
