Tom's Diner
"Tom's Diner" is a song written in 1982 by American singer and songwriter Suzanne Vega. It was first released as a track on the April 1987 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 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, Nikki D. 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, a diner on the corner of Broadway and 112th Street. Singer and songwriter Suzanne Vega was reputedly a frequent patron of the eatery during the early 1980s when she was a student at nearby Barnard College. The mid-twentieth century diner would later become famous as a location for some exterior scenes in the popular 1990s television sitcom 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 causes 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. 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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