Warren Zevon. What can we say about Warren Zevon? He had a style all his own, but he didn’t see a lot of commercial success until 1976, when Linda Ronstadt covered several of his song on her album “Hasten Down the Wind,” including a song that many people don’t even know Warren Zevon wrote and recorded: “Poor, Poor, Pitiful Me.” Until I was quite a bit older, I always assumed Warren Zevon’s version was the cover and Linda Ronstadt’s the original.
In 1978, though, Warren hit the big time with the album “Excitable Boy,” which included not only the title song but also “Lawyers, Guns and Money” and “Werewolves of London.”
These are my favorite Warren Zevon tunes, in no particular order.
Lawyers, Guns and Money (1978): This is an iconic piece, an elegy of a young man who keeps finding himself in trouble around the world, and who keeps appealing to his evidently well-heeled father to send “lawyers, guns and money.” Really, you have to wonder why the old man doesn’t just cut him off.
Amazingly, this song was once covered by Hank Williams, Jr. – who knew?
Excitable Boy (1978): This is a weird song, even for Warren Zevon. It’s a dark story hiding behind a peppy, upbeat song. The title character, a boy with what we would call severe attention-deficit disorder. He murders his prom date, and when released from an institution ten years later, digs up her grave to make a cage for himself from her bones.Like I said, that one’s weird even for Warren Zevon.
Then there’s this:Poor Poor Pitiful Me (1976): This song is probably best known as a Linda Ronstadt song, but it was Warren Zevon who not only recorded it first but also wrote it. Even Warren Zevon’s version, done before Linda Ronstadt’s gender-swapped take, had something of a country-western twang. And Warren, in his release of the song, had one thing Linda didn’t – Lindsey Buckingham on backup vocals.
See Also: Start Your Weekend Right With 6 Great '70s-Era Fleetwood Mac Songs
Carmelita (1976): Oddly, this one also has an almost western sound to it. And it’s a typically Wild West tale of a drifter and addict, whose girl, Carmelita, is the one good thing he has going for him. Warren Zevon hastened to note, years later, that he had no such addiction himself, other than what he called a “brief flirtation.” Given the nature of the music business, especially then in the late ‘60s, that’s to his credit – even if it did lead to some dark themes in his work.
Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner (1978): Another dark tune. This one follows a Norwegian mercenary, fighting in the Congo. He is killed and presumably decapitated, but his body continues to fire away at the enemy – thus the refrain.A tale of grim determination in the face of death, perhaps? Perhaps.
Werewolves of London (1978): Wow, this has to be my favorite Warren Zevon song. Werewolves are the ultimate cryptid. If you’ve seen one, you’d remember it, and the photographs you get will probably be typically grainy and ambiguous. But if you ever see a werewolf drinking a pina colada in Trader Vic’s, you can count on his hair being perfect.See Also: Start Your Weekend Right With 6 Great Peter Gabriel Songs
Warren Zevon finally made it into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2025, under the “music influence” category, because of the impact he made on rock & roll. Last June, a multi-album set, new versions of some of his old tunes, remixed: “Sounds of the Summer” was released. It’s probably worth ducking over the Spotify to give it a listen. I already did.
I’m sure you all have a Warren Zevon favorite or two of your own. The comments are all yours!
Editor's Note: This article was updated post-publication to remove a sentence indicating Zevon is still alive, as he passed in 2003, and to correct the description of "Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner's" occupation. We regret the errors.
