Warren Zevon
Warren William Zevon (January 24, 1947 – September 7, 2003)[1] was an American rock singer, songwriter, and musician. His most famous compositions include "Werewolves of London", "Lawyers, Guns and Money", and "Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner". All three songs are featured on his third album, Excitable Boy (1978), the title track of which is also well-known. He also wrote major hits that were recorded by other artists, including "Poor Poor Pitiful Me", "Accidentally Like a Martyr", "Mohammed's Radio", "Carmelita", and "Hasten Down the Wind".
Warren Zevon
Warren William Zevon
- Sandy moi Zevon
- Stephen Lyme
January 24, 1947
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
September 7, 2003 (aged 56)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Songwriter, musician
- Vocals
- guitar
- piano
- harmonica
1965–2003
Zevon had early music industry successes as a session musician, jingle composer, songwriter, touring musician, musical coordinator, and bandleader. Despite all of that, Zevon struggled to break through in his solo career until his music was performed by Linda Ronstadt, beginning with her 1976 album Hasten Down the Wind. It launched a cult following that lasted 25 years, with Zevon making occasional returns to album and single charts until his death from mesothelioma in 2003. He briefly found a new audience by teaming up with members of R.E.M. in the blues rock outfit Hindu Love Gods for a 1990 album release, although no tour followed. In 2023, Zevon was nominated for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.[2]
Known for his dry wit and acerbic lyrics, he was a guest numerous times on Late Night with David Letterman and the Late Show with David Letterman.
Early life[edit]
Zevon was born in Chicago, the son of Beverly Cope (née Simmons) and William Zevon. His father was a Jewish immigrant from Ukraine, whose original surname was Zivotofsky.[3] William Zevon worked as a bookie who handled volume bets and dice games for the notorious Los Angeles mobster Mickey Cohen.[4] He worked for years in the Cohen gang, in which he was known as Stumpy Zevon, and was best man at Cohen's first wedding.[5] Warren's mother was from a Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints family and of English descent.[6][7][8] They moved to Fresno, California. By the age of 13, Zevon was an occasional visitor to the home of Igor Stravinsky, where he briefly studied modern classical music alongside Robert Craft. Zevon's parents divorced when he was 16 years old. He soon quit high school and moved from Los Angeles to New York City to become a folk singer.[9]
Zevon turned to a musical career early, forming a musical duo with his high school friend, Violet Santangelo, called lyme and cybelle. Bones Howe produced their first single, the minor hit "Follow Me", which was written by Zevon and Santangelo and reached number 65 on the Billboard pop charts in April 1966. A follow-up single, a cover of Bob Dylan's "If You Gotta Go, Go Now" flopped, and Zevon left the duo. A third single without Zevon and another session that included him but was not previously released were included on the 2003 compilation The First Sessions.
Zevon spent time as a session musician and jingle composer. He wrote several songs for his White Whale labelmates The Turtles ("Like the Seasons" and "Outside Chance"), though his participation in their recording—if any—is unknown.[10] Another early Zevon composition ("She Quit Me") was included in the soundtrack for the film Midnight Cowboy (1969); to suit its place in the film, the song was re-recorded by Leslie Miller as "He Quit Me".
Zevon's first attempt at a solo album, Wanted Dead or Alive (1970), was spearheaded by 1960s cult figure Kim Fowley but received almost no attention and did not sell well. Though Zevon continued to play occasional live dates as a solo artist, the next several years of his career were dominated by session work with other musicians.
During the early 1970s, Zevon toured regularly with The Everly Brothers as keyboard player, band leader, and musical coordinator.[9] Later the same decade, he toured with Don Everly and Phil Everly separately as they tried to launch solo careers after their breakup. He worked particularly closely with Phil, arranging and playing keyboards on his first and third solo albums (Star Spangled Springer (1973) and Mystic Line (1975)) and co-writing tracks on his second and third albums (Phil's Diner (1974) and the aforementioned Mystic Line). Zevon's song "Carmelita" was also recorded by Canadian singer Murray McLauchlan on his self-titled album of 1972.
These small successes were not particularly rewarding financially, and Zevon's dissatisfaction with his career (and a lack of funds) led him to briefly move to Spain in the summer of 1975. He lived and played in the Dubliner Bar, a small tavern in Sitges, near Barcelona, owned by David Lindell, who was a mercenary. Together they composed "Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner".
Personal crisis and first comeback[edit]
Zevon's 1982 release The Envoy returned to the high standard of Excitable Boy but was not a commercial success.[15] It was an eclectic but characteristic set that included such compositions as "Ain't That Pretty at All", "Charlie's Medicine" and "Jesus Mentioned", the first of Zevon's two musical reactions to the death of Elvis Presley; the other is the song "Porcelain Monkey" on Life'll Kill Ya in 2000. The album also contains the first of Zevon's writing collaborations with respected writers of fiction: "The Overdraft", co-written with Thomas McGuane. The title track was dedicated to Philip Habib, U.S. special envoy to the Middle East during the early 1980s. In the liner notes for the 1996 anthology I'll Sleep When I'm Dead, Zevon stated that after the song came out, Habib sent him "a very nice letter of appreciation on State Department stationery".[16] The lyrics of another track, "The Hula Hula Boys", were excerpted in Hunter S. Thompson's 1983 book The Curse of Lono.
In 1983 Zevon, who was recently divorced, became engaged to Philadelphia disc jockey Anita Gevinson and moved to the East Coast.[17] After The Envoy was poorly received by critics, Asylum Records ended their business relationship with Zevon, which Zevon discovered only when he read about it in the "Random Notes" column of Rolling Stone. Following these career setbacks, he relapsed into drug and alcohol abuse. In 1984, he voluntarily checked himself into a rehab clinic in Minnesota. His relationship with Gevinson ended shortly thereafter.[17] Zevon retreated from the music business for several years, except for playing live solo shows; during this time he finally overcame severe alcohol and drug addictions.
During this time, Zevon collaborated with Bill Berry, Peter Buck and Mike Mills (of R.E.M.), and backup vocalist Bryan Cook to form a minor project called Hindu Love Gods. The group released the non-charting single "Narrator" for IRS Records in 1984, then went into abeyance for several years.
Berry, Buck and Mills served as the core of Zevon's next studio band when he re-emerged in 1987 by signing with Virgin Records and recording the album Sentimental Hygiene. The release, hailed as his best since Excitable Boy, featured a thicker rock sound and taut, often humorous songs like "Detox Mansion", "Bad Karma" (which featured R.E.M. lead singer Michael Stipe on backup vocals), and "Reconsider Me". Included were contributions from Neil Young, Bob Dylan, Flea, Brian Setzer, and George Clinton, as well as Berry, Buck, and Mills. Also on hand were Zevon's longtime collaborators Jorge Calderón and Waddy Wachtel.
During the Sentimental Hygiene sessions, Zevon also participated in an all-night jam session with Berry, Buck and Mills, as they worked their way through rock and blues numbers by the likes of Bo Diddley, Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson and Prince. Though the sessions were not initially intended for release, they eventually saw the light of day as a Hindu Love Gods album.
The immediate follow-up to Sentimental Hygiene was 1989's Transverse City, a futuristic concept album inspired by Zevon's interest in the work of cyberpunk science fiction author William Gibson. It featured guests including Little Feat drummer Richie Hayward, Jefferson Airplane and Hot Tuna bassist Jack Casady, noted jazz keyboardist Chick Corea and various guitarists, including Wachtel, David Lindley, Jerry Garcia, Jorma Kaukonen, David Gilmour and Neil Young. Key tracks include the title song, "Splendid Isolation", "Run Straight Down" (which had a promotional video that featured Zevon singing in a factory while Gilmour played guitar solos), and "They Moved the Moon" (one of Zevon's eerier ballads).
Death[edit]
Zevon died of mesothelioma on September 7, 2003, aged 56, at his home in Los Angeles.[28] His body was cremated, and his ashes were scattered into the Pacific Ocean near Los Angeles.
Posthumous releases and awards[edit]
A tribute album titled Enjoy Every Sandwich: The Songs of Warren Zevon was released October 19, 2004. Zevon's son, Jordan Zevon, was the executive producer of the album and performed "Studebaker", a previously unfinished composition by his father. A second tribute album, Hurry Home Early: The Songs of Warren Zevon ("hurry home early" is from the song "Boom Boom Mancini", on the album Sentimental Hygiene) was released by Wampus Multimedia on July 8, 2005.
On February 14, 2006, VH1 Classic premiered a music video from a new compilation, Reconsider Me: The Love Songs. The video, titled "She's Too Good for Me", aired every hour on the hour throughout the day.
First and last issues of the Zevon albums Stand in the Fire and The Envoy were released on March 27, 2007, by Rhino Records, alongside a Rhino re-issue of Excitable Boy, with the three CDs having four unreleased bonus tracks each. Noteworthy rarities include the outtakes "Word of Mouth" and "The Risk" from the Envoy sessions and "Frozen Notes (Strings Version)", a melancholy outtake from Excitable Boy performed on acoustic piano with a string quartet.
Ammal Records was a new label started up as a partnership with New West Records by Zevon's former boss at Artemis, Danny Goldberg. On May 1, 2007, Ammal released Preludes: Rare and Unreleased Recordings, a two-disc anthology of Zevon demos and alternate versions culled from 126 pre-1976 recordings that were kept in a suitcase. The album contains five previously unreleased songs: "Empty Hearted Town", "Going All the Way", "Steady Rain", "Stop Rainin' Lord" and "The Rosarita Beach Cafe", along with Zevon's original demo of "Studebaker". Selections from an interview of Zevon by the Austin-based radio personality Jody Denberg are blended with about 40 minutes of music on the collection's second disc.
The Wind was certified gold by the RIAA in December 2003, and Zevon received five posthumous Grammy nominations, including Song of the Year for the ballad "Keep Me in Your Heart".[29] The Wind won two Grammys, with the album itself receiving the award for Best Contemporary Folk Album, while "Disorder in the House", Zevon's duet with Bruce Springsteen, was awarded Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal. These posthumous awards were the first Grammys of Zevon's thirty-plus year career.
Personal life[edit]
Zevon was married to Crystal, and their daughter Ariel Zevon was born in 1976. Ariel Zevon is a singer-songwriter and former café owner in Vermont.[30] Warren Zevon and Marilyn Livingston Dillow had a son, Jordan Zevon in 1969. Jordan Zevon is a singer, musician, and songwriter.
Zevon was a friend of United States Representative Steve Cohen, at the time a State Senator, the two attended the 2000 Democratic National Convention together.[31]
Biographical works[edit]
I'll Sleep When I'm Dead: The Dirty Life and Times of Warren Zevon, a biography by his ex-wife, Crystal Zevon, was published in 2007 by Ecco Books. The book is largely an oral history that consists of interviews with Zevon's friends, relatives and associates, as well as excerpts from his diaries. Crystal Zevon said Warren had given her permission to use the journal excerpts and instructed her to present an unvarnished portrayal of his life that did not sanitize his many struggles.
George Plasketes, a professor at Auburn University, wrote a critical study of Zevon's music in 2016, Warren Zevon, Desperado of Los Angeles. Zevon was also the subject of Michael Flood's essay "Lord Byron's Luggage: Warren Zevon and the Redefinition of Literature Rock". A collection of short stories by Kelly Lynn Thomas, Miss Gun to a Knife Fight: Stories, is composed of retellings of songs by Zevon.
In 2012, George Gruel, a photographer who worked as Zevon's aide-de-camp from 1978 to 1983, published a book of photos of Zevon. It is entitled Lawyers, Guns and Photos.[32]
