![]() “Boom Boom Mancini” is a rarity: a boxing song that evokes “the sweet science” in its music and lyrics. – Rich Wilhelm provide rock solid backing, while Zevon’s lead guitar and piano solos bring the essential workout gym grit. Still, they’re driven home by the music, singing, and playing. Lyrically, Zevon pulls no punches recounting Mancini’s career from the highs (the victory against Arturo Frias) to the lows (the fight against Duk Koo Kim that led to Kim’s death four days later).įrom the opening lyrics, “Hurry home early – hurry on home / Boom Boom Mancini’s fighting Bobby Chacon”, Zevon’s words are detailed and evocative. There are many songs about boxers and boxing, ranging from earnest (“The Boxer” – Simon and Garfunkel) to topical (“Hurricane” – Bob Dylan) to funny (“I Think I Can Beat Mike Tyson” – DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince). My potentially hot take is that Zevon’s biography of Ray “Boom Boom” Mancini is the best boxing song of them all. “Detox Mansion” is, among many other things, an indication that Zevon still had plenty of great tricks up his sleeve and wasn’t about to shy away from his messy past for lyrical inspiration. – Chris Ingalls With a swaggering, guitar-heavy garage funk vibe, Zevon – with the help of co-writer and frequent collaborator Jorge Calderon – indulges in self-deprecation and a little sly name-dropping: “I’m gone to Detox Mansion / Way down on Last Breath Farm / I’ve been raking leaves with Liza / Me and Liz cleaned up the yard.” The band is loud and scruffy, and Zevon seems positively revitalized. ![]() Sentimental Hygiene was a giant creative leap forward for the singer-songwriter, partly due to his healthy lifestyle but also the solid musicianship backing him up (including three-quarters of R.E.M. Leave it to Zevon to include a sarcastic jab at celebrity rehab centers on his first “sober” album. With that in mind, we present ten songs from the second half of Zevon’s career that may not have the instant recognition factor of “Werewolves of London” or “Lawyers, Guns and Money”, but certainly deserve to be placed among those great songs. It’s a shame because his clean and sober period is filled with excellent material that bolsters his reputation as a master storyteller and musical craftsman. While the record, and the six studio releases that followed before his death in 2003, ushered in a new, highly focused stage in his career, Zevon’s earlier days provided him with his most recognizable songs. Warren Zevon: you might never have wanted him around for a quiet dinner, but you do need this Bargain Buy.Thirty-five years ago, this month, after a five-year recording absence, Warren Zevon released Sentimental Hygiene, one of his most critically acclaimed albums. The biography/oral history by his wife Crystal - I'll Sleep When I'm Dead The Dirty Life and Times of Warren Zevon - makes for compelling if very uneasy reading.Īnd his great line on the Letterman Show when asked what having cancer had taught him always bears repeating: "Enjoy every sandwich". Zevon has appeared at Elsewhere frequently, there is a 1992 interview and reviews of later and posthumous albums. ![]() His five albums from 1976 - Warren Zevon, Excitable Boy, Bad Luck Steak in the Dancing School, the live Stand in the Fire and The Envoy - captured him at his best.Īnd they are all packaged together for $20 at JB Hi-Fi here. Īlways listened to by critics (often getting four and five star reviews), Zevon's music was a deep as it was inventive and he counted among his many admirers Browne (who produced his debut), Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Springsteen, Tom Waits, various Eagles, a swag of LA's best session musicians, T Bone Burnett.Īlthough his career suffered diminishing commercial returns in the Nineties by the time of his slow death from cancer he was being widely acclaimed for the bent genius he was. It was an exceptional album and its dark corners (Desperados Under the Eaves) hinted at what was to come as he declined into self-destructive alcoholism.īut he just kept cracking great songs: Werewolves of London, Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner, Excitable Boy, the frat-boy anthem Lawyers Guns and Money (all of those on his Excitable Boy album), Jeannie Needs a Shooter (co-written with Bruce Springsteen), Play It All Night Long. His sardonic wit and sometimes weird songs caught the ears and the imaginations of critics and fellow artists, although it took Werewolves of London to be a hit before the rest of the world really tuned in.īut from his self-titled debut album Linda Ronstadt covered Poor Poor Pitiful Me, Hasten Down the Wind, Carmelita and Mohammed's Radio. When he emerged in LA in the mid Seventies he was like the anti-Jackson Browne: he was the anthesis of those mellow singer-songwriters from Laurel Canyon. Singer songwriter Warren Zevon (1947- 2003) was a different one alright. ![]()
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