(Photo from Wikipedia)

Warren Zevon would have turned 64 yesterday.  I was, and continue to be, a big fan of his music.  I saw him live once – a New Jersey concert in the early 1980s that MTV showed a gazillion times in their early years.

One of the first things I ever wrote, in the days after he passed away from lung cancer in 2003, was an appreciation of the man and his music through several of his songs.  I apologize that I haven't been able to embed videos the last few days.  I have provided links at the end.

“Outside Chance:” Strictly speaking, this is not a Zevon recording. Rather, it’s a song he wrote for the Turtles, who released it as a single in 1966.  Although it failed to chart, it had enough of a snarly attitude toward love that it’s included in the Nuggets box set (as well as “Follow Me,” a song Zevon recorded with his then-wife Tule under the name Lyme and Cybelle). The connection to the Turtles was fortuitous – a Zevon song popped up as the B-side of their biggest hit, “Happy Together,” and the royalties helped pay Zevon’s rent (and bar tab)  for years.

“Poor Poor Pitiful Me:” This was the first Zevon song to chart, as a single for Linda Ronstadt in 1976.  (She would record several of his tunes, including “Carmelita” and the title song from Hasten Down the Wind.)  It’s a rollicking tune, full of Zevon’s trademark mordant wit, about a schlub who’s driven to such distraction by his love life that he can’t even commit suicide successfully.  A typical line:

          She put me through some changes, Lord

          Sort of like a Waring blender.  

“Werewolves of London:” This is the one Zevon song everyone knows, a rock-radio staple and his only single to hit the Top 40.  (Like Randy Newman, to whom he’s often compared, Zevon’s only hit single was considered a novelty.)  It’s the quintessential Zevon portrait of man – cultured on the outside (tailored clothes, perfectly coiffed hair), but beastly on the inside. I love the line “Little old lady got mutilated late last night” – try singing it, you’ll feel like your tongue is dancing.  Whenever I hear the song, however, I remember the version on his 1981 live album Stand In the Fire, where he maliciously changes the line “I’d like to meet his tailor” to “He’s looking for James Taylor.”

“Excitable Boy:” The title song of the only Zevon album to hit the Top Ten, it has the nastiest lyrics ever set to a cheerful ditty.  While Zevon recounts the tale of a sociopathic teenager who rapes and kills his junior prom date, the backup singers, led by Ronstadt, joyfully sing, “Ooh-wah-ooh!”  For the final stanza: 

          After ten long years, they let him out of the home

          Excitable boy, they all said,

          Then he dug up her grave and built a cage with her bones

          Excitable boy, they all said.  

(Photo from his official website)

"Ain’t That Pretty At All:”  My own personal favorite, it features a droning, headache-inducing synthesizer, as Zevon expresses his boredom with the beauty of the world (“I’ve been to Paris, and it ain’t that pretty at all”) and his preference to “hurl myself against the wall / Because I’d rather feel bad than feel nothing at all.” He’s even proud to have spent his vacation getting a root canal.  My favorite moment is when, instead of repeating the title, he screams, “GUESS WHAT?” In the final verse, he expresses his wish to go back to the Louvre and “get a good running start and hurl myself against the wall.”  Been there, haven’t done that.

“Detox Mansion:” Zevon’s drinking problem got so bad that one friend dubbed him “F. Scott Fitzevon,” and in the early 1980s, he finally went into rehab and was sober for the last 20 years of his life.  Of course, when Zevon finally sang about sobering up, the lyrics had the usual bite: “I’ve been raking leaves with Liza / Me and Liz clean up the yard.”  Nor was he big on self-affirmation:

          Well, it's tough to be somebody

          And it's hard not to fall apart

          Up here on Rehab Mountain   

          We gonna learn these things by heart.

The song’s co-writer, Jorge Calderon, was Zevon’s friend and most frequent collaborator. Not surprisingly, they first met when a mutual friend asked Calderon to bail Zevon out of a drunk tank.

“Raspberry Beret:” Yes, that Prince song.  Many of the top musicians collaborated with Zevon at some point – Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young, Ronstadt, the Eagles, Bob Dylan, even George Clinton.  In the late 1980s, Zevon teamed with R.E.M. to record a collection of cover songs under the name Hindu Love Gods.  Their bouncy take on Prince’s pop hit was the session’s best cut.

“Splendid Isolation”:  I love this song from Transverse City, especially for its depiction of a pathetic pop star:  

          Michael Jackson in Disneyland

          Don't have to share it with nobody else  

          Lock the gates, Goofy, take my hand

          And lead me through the World of Self.    

As soon as Zevon says “Goofy,” I giggle and realize I could never take Jackson seriously again.

“My Shit’s Fucked Up:” The song begins:

          Well, I went to the doctor

          I said, "I'm feeling kind of rough"

          He said, "I'll break it to you, son

          Your shit's fucked up."                       

Two years after Zevon recorded this in 2000, he felt chest pains while exercising, and went to a doctor for the first time in 20 years. (His best-of might be titled “Genius,” but even geniuses are stupid about some things. Zevon called it "one of those phobias that didn't really pay off.")  Although he had stopped smoking several years earlier after a life-long habit, it was too late to prevent the spreading of an inoperable form of lung cancer.  

“The Hockey Song (Hit Somebody):” This tune, about a hockey goon who dreams of scoring just one goal, features background vocals by David Letterman. (He’s the one yelling “Hit somebody!” during the chorus.)  Zevon was a frequent guest on Letterman’s shows, often sitting in with the band when he was in town, and he sometimes subbed for Paul Shafer as bandleader.  Shortly after Zevon revealed his fatal diagnosis, Letterman - who Zevon called "the best friend my music ever had" - devoted an entire show to him, both interview and performance.  (Excerpts can be found on YouTube.) 

Zevon inspired loyalty in his many show business friends – among those who helped him record his final CD were Springsteen, Tom Petty, Don Henley, Dwight Yoakam, Emmylou Harris and old buddy Jackson Browne.  During the last year of Zevon’s life, Dylan frequently performed Zevon songs in concert as a tribute.

“She’s Too Good For Me:” Zevon survived long enough to see the release of his final CD, The Wind, which debuted at No. 16 (there’s no p.r. like death!).  Whereas his two previous records were full of literary allusions – he co-wrote several songs with prose writers like Carl Hiassen and Hunter Thompson – the final record was stripped down lyrically, though certainly not emotionally.  His voice sounded softer than it ever had – I attribute that more to loss of energy rather than peace of mind. 

On a few of the songs, he’s (as Letterman described it) “spitting in the face of death,” but death is the subject of every song, and usually not even between the lines.  “Prison Grove” portrays death as a release from imprisonment, and I’m sure the obviousness of “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door” was part of its appeal to him.  The songs that are most memorable, though, are the two where he makes his peace with lost loves, “El Amor De Mi Vida” (“I only wish it had been us / But I’m happy for your happiness”) and “She’s Too Good For Me,” which has the sweetest verse he ever wrote:   

          I want her to be happy

          I want her to be free

          I want her to be everything she couldn't be with me.                    

If you can listen without shedding a few tears, you should be ashamed of yourself.

Well, Warren, as another show-biz legend who died around the same time as you used to say: Thanks for the memories.  And next time I hear thunder, I’ll assume you’re hurling yourself against the walls of heaven.