Warren Zevon - Excitable Boy

For most of us Warren Zevon generally conjures up one song, "Werewolves of London" and that's about as far as it goes. That particular song was one I was very dismissive of back in the day. To me it was a hatchet job that borrowed too much from "Sweet Home Alabama" and tried too hard to be clever. Yeah, fifteen year old me was a pretty harsh critic.

I will begrudgingly admit that over the years the song certainly had it's charms, and Warren's unusual voice and writing is oddly engaging. In the mid '80s my old roommate had the record, and I remember playing it quite a few times and I really enjoyed a number of the songs, particularly "Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner" and "Lawyers, Guns And Money" as well as the title track, which was about as dark and twisted as songs come.

With the passage of time I'd more or less forget the album, and when Kid Rock's oddly goofy and somehow catchy sampling of bits and pieces of "Werewolves of London" on "All Summer Long" it sort of soothed the divide between Skynyrd and Zevon's variations on a relatively basic chord progression. 

To me, as a casual fan, this album represents all I need from Mr. Zevon. If there a complaint about the album it's that it's a taut half hour of tight pop songs wrapped in lyrical oddities that at nine songs was too short and was over just as it seemed to be building up a head of steam. I suppose this was an example of leave your fans wanting more.

Warren was in his early thirties when this came out, and still looked like a kid. His voice always seemed disconnected from the youthful image on the cover. It was his folk singers gravel laden delivery that helped to convey the emotion packed into the songs. A cursory listen give the songs a snappy happy feel, and many of the arrangements act as a counterpoint to the subject matter if you take the time to really listen. It's too bad my copy of the album didn't have a lyric sheet, so I made a point of looking up the songs and reading along as the songs played, and it revealed a far deeper experience than I was expecting.  The bouncy title track takes on a truly macabre tone and it's hard to reconcile the joyous abandon to the music with the story of a young excitable boy digging up the bones of a girl he'd killed and making a cage out of her bones.

I know I listed the songs I'd had an affinity to earlier, and I still love those songs as that's where the nostalgia meets the present. With only nine songs, there really isn't a dud anywhere. There's a reason this is considered essential listening for fan of his work.

The cast of characters on the album represented much of the LA scene, especially the clique who floated around with Linda Ronstadt. There was Russ Kunkel on drums, Leland Sklar, Bob Glaub, and Kenny Edwards on bass and on backing vocals Jackson Browne, Karla Bonoff and Linda on backing vocals. It was pretty sweet. Heck, a young Jeff Porcaro plays drums too. The big surprise I didn't know about was the Mick Fleetwood and John McVie were the rhythm section on "Werewolves of London."

The album sounds amazing, and was produced by Jackson Browne and Waddy Wachtel. I'll admit that Waddy now feels tainted since his "troubles" in the late '90s, but who knows what went on, and he pleaded no contest and did his "time" so to speak. I'm not trying to sweep it under the carpet or somehow make light of the situation. Trying to separate the art from the artists isn't always easy, and while I celebrate Waddy and his abilities what happened has coloured his past. Again this isn't to be dismissive of what happened, but he seems to be in a different category than Gary Glitter. 

This is about Warren and my goodness this is an essential album. It's the only one I have, and sure if I found other releases I'd likely consider picking them up, but for me this is where it starts and ends. This would be his most successful album and it would go gold in '78 and slowly but surely almost two decades later Excitable Boy would be certified platinum.

If your only foray into Mister Zevon is his "hit" I would suggest giving a proper listen to some of the songs here. It'll change your mind ... it changed mine.