Eschatological Weather Report
Eschatological Weather Report is a song by the prolific and influential cult-musician Tom Waits. Recorded for the first and only time in late 2023[1] the song was intended to be released on Waits' forthcomming album The End Times. The song was recorded live in front of a small hipster audience. The lyrics - essentially a poem set to music - were growled by Tom Waits. He was accompanied by The Four Horsemen - a jazz quartet comprising; Bill "Pestilence" Goodwin on drums, a post-op Pete "Famine" Christlieb on tennor sax, Mike "War" Melvoin taking Waits' piano duties when he was too drunk to play himself and finally the now deceased Jim "Death" Hughart at the upright bass.
Destruction[edit | edit source]
Unfortunately, later that year, the tapes of The End Times live session were destroyed when the ground below the recording studio cracked open, forming a chasm which swallowed the entire city.
Waits was out of town at the time and so survived. He reportedly toyed with the idea of re-recording the Eschatological Weather Report for a single release but this was sadly made infeasable by the eventual destruction and rebirth of the planet in fire the following year, at which time recording studios, electricity, the tennor sax[2] and in fact Tom Waits himself were lost forever.
All that survived of the song are the lyrics, which were found under rubble, etched on the formica wall of a toilet stall in a downtown LA diner
Lyrics[edit | edit source]
- well, an innebriated good evening to you all
- welcome to raphael's underground lounge
- I wanna pull on your coat about something here, yeah
- little news i'd like to throw in your direction
- i know things are tough all over,
- they ain't getting any better
- well i was moved, to spin a little eschatological weather report your way
- what we're talking about is late night and early morning low temperatures
- with a chance of rastafarian fog
- chance of showers into the afternoon
- with variable high fireiness
- and gusty winds,
- gusty winds at times uprooting trees and mountains
- yeah i know, things are tough all over
- when the thunder storms start increasing over the southeast and south central portions of my apartment, I know Zeus is upset
- and a line of thunderstorms was developing in the early morning hours ahead of a cold front to end cold fronts
- cold blooded
- with tornado watches issued shortly before noon Sunday, and fire raining from the sky,
ladies and gentlemen, I'd stay home - still cold out there
- spring ain't coming
- colder than Sköll's smile at the Ámsvartnir lake, on a Saturday night
- poison flood water covered the southern portion of the globe
- there was severe weather well into the afternoon, the skies tore and the seas began to boil
- high pressure zone,
- covering the eastern portion of jeruselem,
- Gog and Magog look wild
- and a weak pressure front leading the dead through the streets
- cause since your teachings left us buddha
- and the sun disappeared from the sky
- well, the extended outlook for an indefinite period of time until you come back to us haile
- is fire tonight, war tomorrow,
- and precipitation is expected
References[edit | edit source]
- Eicher, Dave J., The Longest Night: The Day the Sun Vanished, Simon & Schuster, 2037, ISBN 0-684-84944-5.
- Christ, Jesus H., How to Win Followers and Subjugate People, Frederick A. Praeger, 2051.
- Fuller, Maj. Gen. J. F. C., The Battle of Jeruselem, Da Capo Press, 2029, ISBN 0-306-80450-6.
- Vishnu, Shiva, and Shakti, samsāra: the déjà vu of reincarnation, University of Illinois Press, 15th ed, 2283, ISBN 0-252-00918-5.
- Kennedy, John F., Fom Hell, The Rise and Rise of Baldr, Houghton Mifflin Co., 2070, ISBN 0-395-74012-6.