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Waits, Tom & Kronos Quartet - Diamond In Your Mind
Identifier
021872
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
"Diamond in Your Mind", which Waits wrote for Wilson's Woyzeck, did not appear on Waot's own album Blood Money; however, it did emerge on Solomon Burke's album Don't Give Up on Me of the same year. While Waits has played the song live a number of times, an official version would not be released until 2007.
On July 10, 2007, Waits released the download-only digital single "Diamond in Your Mind". The version of the song was recorded with Kronos Quartet, with Greg Cohen, Philip Glass, and The Dalai Lama at the benefit concert "Healing The Divide: A Concert for Peace and Reconciliation" at Avery Fisher Hall, recorded on September 21, 2003.
A description of the experience
Tom Waits & Kronos Quartet - Diamond In Your Mind
(written by Tom Waits/Kathleen Brennan 2000)
(performed by Tom Waits & Kronos Quartet, for HEALING THE DIVIDE)
I shook hands with the president and the pope in Rome
I've been to parties where I've had to be flown
This taught me everything is sacred, nothing is profane
Money is something you throw off of the back of a train
Always keep a diamond in your mind
Always keep a diamond in your mind
Wherever you may wander
Wherever you may roam
Always keep a diamond in your mind
Steam of the gravy with little fried pearls
Floating like a necklace on a beautiful girl
And Chalmers said thanks for the food and the land
And something about God I just don't understand
Always keep a diamond in your mind
Always keep a diamond in your mind
Wherever you may wander
Wherever you may roam
Always keep a diamond in your mind
She's got the milk of human kindness and the fat of the lamb
Skin like a baby, but she drives like a man
She lives in Natchez and she operates a crane
She's like a wrecking ball that's no longer connected to the chain
Zerelda Samuel said she ain't never prayed
Since her right arm was blown off in the Pinkerton raid
They lashed her to a windmill with three-fingered Dave
Now she's 102 and drinking juleps in the shade
Always keep a diamond in your mind
Always keep a diamond in your mind
Wherever you may wander
Wherever you may roam
Always keep a diamond in your mind