RIFFS

Sarah Jane Morris on Tom Waits's 'Blue Valentine'

I first heard "Blue Valentine" when my husband serenaded me with it 10 years ago after a Communards gig. He was on the Communards tour, playing didgeridoo during "Don't Leave Me This Way". He didn't sing the song at my casement; he sang it at his flat in Norwich.

For a song with such a sentimental surface, it's a very threatening, dramatic song. When I sing it I see myself standing in a run-down, seedy place having to face up to a person whose heart I've broken but on whom I've never really closed the door properly. It's a highly poetic song but there's a real undertow of violence. You sense that you might become the object of vengeance, and that you'd deserve everything you get.

The thing about Tom Waits is that he's had such a perfect career: always doing what he wants, always being hip, always making great records. I'd love him to write me a song.