A decade earlier, though, the restaurant had been immortalized in a "song" (more like a rhythm poem) by Suzanne Vega called Tom's Diner. Written in 1982, the original recording first appeared on a magazine sampler in 1984 and, three years later, became the opening track on Vega's album Solitude Standing.
In 1990, the British group DNA used Vega's original a capella version of the song and added instrumentation to give Vega her second hit (after "Luka").
A bit of trivia. Karlheinz Brandenbur used the original Vega track to test his MP3 technology on which he was working, saying that he wanted to make sure that the compression didn't detract from the warm tones of Vega's voice.
The original a capella version.
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