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About the song:
"Tom's Diner" is an a cappella pop song written in 1981 by American
singer-songwriter Suzanne Vega. It was first released as a track on
the January 1984 issue of Fast Folk Musical Magazine. When first
featured on one of her own studio albums, it appeared as the first
track of her Solitude Standing album in 1987. It was later used as the
basis for a popular remix by the British group DNA in 1990. The 1991
release Tom's Album includes the DNA version as well as cover versions
by such artists as After One, Chicago-based band Canasta, and Bingo
Hand Job (R.E.M. and Billy Bragg). It was also used as the
background soundtrack for the opening scene of the 1993 film Untamed
Heart.
The "Tom's Diner" of the song is Tom's Restaurant in New York City,
which was later fictionalized as Monk's Cafe in Seinfeld.
The song is written as a simple first person vignette of someone
stopping at a diner for a cup of coffee. The song notes the newspaper
as well as two women, one who enters the diner and one who stands
outside in the rain. The ringing of bells at a nearby cathedral cause
the singer to reminisce on an unnamed companion and a picnic
previously. When the coffee is finished, it is time to leave the diner
to catch a train.
Vega wrote the song based on a comment by her friend Brian Rose, a
photographer, who mentioned that in his work, he sometimes felt as if
"he saw his whole life through a pane of glass, and [...] like he was
the witness to a lot of things, but was never really involved in
them." She attempted to think and write in this fashion (including a
male perspective while sitting at Tom's Restaurant, a diner on the
corner of Broadway and 112th Street in New York City, which would
later become famous as a location for some exterior scenes in the
popular television sitcom Seinfeld. (The building belongs to Columbia
University and houses some of its programs, as well as NASA's Goddard
Institute for Space Studies.) The "bells of the cathedral" that she
remarks hearing in the song are those of the Cathedral of Saint John
the Divine, located one block to the east.
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Lyrics:
I am sitting in the morning
at the diner on the corner
I am waiting at the counter
for the man to pour the coffee
And he fills it only halfway
and before I even argue
he is looking out the window
at sombody coming in
"It is always nice to see you",
says the man behind the counter
to the woman who has come in
she is shaking her umbrella
And I look the other way
as they are kissing their hellos
I'm pretending not to see them
instead I pour the milk
And I open up the paper
there's a story of an actor
who has died while he was drinking
it was no one I had heard of
And I'm turning to the horoscope
and looking for the funnies
when I'm feeling someone watching me
and so i raise my head
There's a woman on the outside
looking inside. does she see me?
no she does not really see me
cause she sees her own reflection
And I'm trying not to notice
that she's hitching up her skirt
While she's straightening her stockings
her hair is getting wet
Oh, this rain it will continue
through the morning as I'm listening
to the bells of the cathedral
I am thinking of your voice...
