Ol' '55

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"Ol' '55"

Single by Tom Waits
from the album 'Closing Time'
Released	1973
Length	3:55
Label	Asylum Records
Writer(s)	Tom Waits

Ol' '55 is a song written and recorded by Tom Waits. It is the first track on Waits' debut album, Closing Time, released in 1973. The song was covered with greater chart success by The Eagles, released on their 1974 album On the Border.

Waits himself has been critical of cover versions of the song, saying he was "not that particularly crazy about [The Eagles'] rendition of it . . . I thought their version was a little antiseptic."[1]

In 1993, an early demo version of this song was released by Bizarre/Straight on The Early Years, Volume Two. The demo version features Waits accompanying himself on acoustic guitar, as opposed to the piano of the Closing Time version.