LINER NOTES OF TOM'S ALBUM

Tom's Restaurant is located on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, near where I used to live. The breakfast special - two eggs over easy, rye toast and coffee. One morning in 1982, it was raining, and I read in the paper that an actor had died. I have never heard of him. I was thinking that people are selfish and would skip over this news to read their own horoscope, which I did. The cathedral bells rang that morning, and I imagined the rest. The song was called Tom's Diner.

Many of you heard the "DNA featuring Suzanne Vega" remix of "Tom's Diner" that was out last year, and most of you know the story. Two enterprising young men from England calling themselves DNA sampled the song fom "Solitude Standing," added a dance track, and released it on a bootleg record as "Oh, Suzanne." Within three days the record company had swooped down and apprehended them. "What shall we do?" they asked me. "Sue them?" "Let's release it as a single, " I said and so they did.

But you haven't heard the other versions that appeared since then, and I've collected many (not all) here. Some are bootlegs, some were done with my permission. These came from all over the world - Germany, Italy, Sweden, USA, Jamaica. The small song about eating breakfast in a diner became a song about accidental pregnancy (Daddy's Little Girl - Nikki D.) and the recent war in the Gulf (Waiting at the Border), among other things. Some incorporate forgotten bits of pop culture (Jeannie's Diner), and some are sung in languages I did not think possible. Some are funny. Some are brilliant. Some are very strange.

Around the time "Tom's Diner" was released, DNA had started to remix and to bootleg "Rusted Pipe" from "Days of Open Hand." I asked them to finish it. That song starts this collection, as a special bonus track.

My advice to you listeners is not to play these songs from beginning to end, but to skip around and find the ones you like. It's all in fun.

Suzanne Vega
1991