When Tom Waits was a boy, he heard the world differently. Sometimes, it sounded so out-of-kilter, it scared him. The rustle of a piece of paper could make him wince, the sound of his mother tucking him in at night might cause him to curl up as if in pain.
‘It wasn’t a cool thing,’ he says, shaking his head lest there be any doubt. ‘It was a frightening thing. I mean, I thought I was mentally ill, that maybe I was retarded. I’d put my hand on a sheet like this [rubbing his shirt] and it’d sound like sandpaper. Or a plane going by.’
Off beat (Observer)