Warren Zevon: Desperado of Los Angeles

749 Pages·2016·3.17 MB·English

by  George Plasketes

Warren Zevon
Tempo
A Rowman & Littlefield Music Series on Rock, Pop, and Culture
Series Editor: Scott Calhoun
Tempo: A Rowman & Littlefield Music Series on Rock,
Pop, and Culture offers titles that explore rock and popular
music through the lens of social and cultural history, revealing
the dynamic relationship between musicians, music, and their
milieu. Like other major art forms, rock and pop music comment
on their cultural, political, and even economic situation,
reflecting the technological advances, psychological concerns,
religious feelings, and artistic trends of their times.
Contributions to the Tempo series are the ideal introduction to
major pop and rock artists and genres.
Bob Dylan: American Troubadour, by Donald Brown Bon Jovi:
America’s Ultimate Band, by Margaret Olson British Invasion:
The Crosscurrents of Musical Influence, by Simon Philo Bruce
Springsteen: American Poet and Prophet, by Donald L. Deardorff
II The Clash: The Only Band That Mattered, by Sean Egan Kris
Kristofferson: Country Highwayman, by Mary G. Hurd Patti
Smith: America’s Punk Rock Rhapsodist, by Eric Wendell Paul
Simon: An American Tune, by Cornel Bonca Ska: The Rhythm of
Liberation, by Heather Augustyn Warren Zevon: Desperado of
Los Angeles, by George Plasketes
Warren Zevon
Desperado of Los Angeles
George Plasketes
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD
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Copyright © 2016 by George Plasketes
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Plasketes, George.
Title: Warren Zevon : desperado of Los Angeles / George Plasketes.
Description: Lanham, Maryland : Published by Rowman & Littlefield, 2016. | Series:
Tempo : A Rowman & Littlefield music series on rock, pop, and culture | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015041682 (print) | LCCN 2015043652 (ebook) | ISBN
9781442234567 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781442234574 (electronic)
Subjects: LCSH: Zevon, Warren. | Rock musicians–United States–Biography.
Classification: LCC ML420.Z475 P53 2016 (print) | LCC ML420.Z475 (ebook) | DDC
782.42166092–dc23 LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015041682
TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences Permanence of Paper for
Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
Always, for Julie
“...we will float.”
Series Editor’s Foreword
Out in Los Angeles in the 1970s, sat Warren Zevon at his
piano, precariously perched on the edge of America’s dream
factory. He was at home on the edge. At the start of his
adolescence, in 1960, Zevon’s parents moved from Chicago into
the Southern California sun. Since then, Zevon had spent most
of his years not so much basking in that sun, its culture, and its
music, but rather dehydrating the L.A. romance of living forever
as a media (and mediated) creation. By 1976, when Zevon was
29—at the trailing edge of what everyone would call youth—he
released his first major-label debut album, titled Warren Zevon.
The buoyant sounds and parched sentiments eponymously
announced a new artist headed in a new direction: here was one
bound to enjoy the ride through canyons overheated from an
interminable sun, singing intimations of mortality.
Zevon’s wit, wordplay, and wonderment at life’s
shortcomings, all wrapped in smartly arranged pop-rock songs,
played against the sun-kissed California singer-songwriters of
the 1970s much like a tonic is to an Orange Julius. George
Plasketes tells this story with a scholar’s assessment of Zevon’s
career and cultural influence, and a
fan’s appreciation for his artistry. Plasketes’s writing
complements Zevon’s lexical dexterity, and each chapter is
itself a delightful direction toward pinning down a renegade’s
craft. Zevon expended some effort to cultivate his outlaw
persona, but
not much. Being drawn to the edges by temperament,
Zevon drew from real life to compose fictions to say what he
saw underneath all the glamour. A consummate reader, making
him one of rock’s most literate songwriters, he knew the power
of a story of a character in crisis, and seemed to court peril as
his muse. Zevon greedily stepped over borders when he could,
to blur the edges and combine forces. He brought a classical
musician’s training to the rock culture milieu; he used more,
and more challenging, words than rock and roll had typically
and more challenging, words than rock and roll had typically
thought necessary to say life was short and then you die, so
savor it; he drank his human tenderness to the brink of
destruction, then, after having enjoyed a long stretch of
regained health, had cancer take him all the way.
For his intelligence, poetics, musicianship, and cultural
criticism, Zevon earned the respect of his contemporaries—the
likes of Jackson Browne, Neil Young, Bruce Springsteen, and Bob
Dylan—and many more in the 1 percent of the showbiz industry.
His signing
to David Geffen’s Asylum Records in the 1970s would prove
monumental for Zevon and Geffen, not to mention all the artists
on the label, and by the end of his life in 2003, he was much
revered and beloved as a result of having lent his hand to many
musical projects. Postmortem celebrations and affections for
Zevon continue to this day, perhaps ironically, as Plasketes
charts throughout this book. For as much as
he has been a central figure since the 1970s in the history
of American singer-songwriters, Zevon has never had the
popular appeal of a Neil Young or a Springsteen. He continues to
cling to the edges, but rewards all who come out to find him.

Scott Calhoun
Timeline
Cultural Events Warren Zevon’s
Life and Career
January 24, 1947: Warren William Zevon born in
Chicago, to parents Beverly Simmons and William
“Stumpy” Zevon (Zivotofsky), a boxer and gambler
January 1949: RCA
introduces the 45 rpm
record
June 1950: The
United States enters the
Korean War
September 1956: Christmas 1956: First piano is a Chickering that
Elvis Presley on The Ed Zevon’s father won playing poker on Christmas Eve
Sullivan Show
February 3, 1959:
Buddy Holly dies in
plane crash
November 1960: 1960: Family moves to California; Zevon begins to
John F. Kennedy elected study classical music, inspired by several meetings with
president composer Robert Craft and Russian maestro Igor
Stravinsky
August 1963: Martin 1963: Parents divorce; Zevon drops out of high
Luther King Jr.’s “I have school junior year, travels cross-country to New York to
a dream” speech follow his Bob Dylan folksinger dream
November 22,
1963: JFK assassinated
in Dallas, Texas
February 9, 1964: 1964: As “stephen lyme,” forms folk-pop duo, lyme
The Beatles’ first and cybelle, with high school classmate Violet
appearance on The Ed Santangelo. The duo signs a recording contract with the
Sullivan Show helps White Whale label and cuts a few singles, though never
launch the British records an album
Invasion
August 1964: The
Beatles film A Hard
Day’s Night
May 1966: The April 1966: “Follow Me” reaches number 64 on
Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds Billboard charts; duo performs on the teen dance show,
released The Lloyd Thaxton Show
June 1967: The 1967: Labelmates the Turtles record the “Follow Me”
Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s B-side, “Like the Seasons,” as the B-side to their
Lonely Hearts Club number-one hit “Happy Together.” They also record
Band, “Summer of Zevon’s “Outside Chance”
Love,” and psychedelia
November 1967:
Debut of Rolling Stone
magazine
June 1968: Robert
Kennedy assassinated
1969: Zevon records first solo album, Wanted: Dead
or Alive, on Imperial label, produced by L.A. cult figure
Kim Fowley. “She Quit Me” (as “He Quit Me”) is included
in the Midnight Cowboy film soundtrack.
August 15–17, August 7, 1969: Son Jordan is born to Marilyn “Tule”
1969: 500,000 gather Livingston
for “three days of peace
and music” at
Woodstock Festival at
dairy farm in Bethel,
New York
April 1970: Paul Early 1970s: Bandleader for the Everly Brothers.
McCartney announces After Everlys break up, moves to Berkeley briefly,
the breakup of the playing the nightly club circuit
Beatles
September 18,
1970: Guitar legend Jimi
Hendrix dies
August 9, 1974: 1974: Marries Crystal Brelsford
Richard Nixon resigns
as president
April 1975: End of Summer 1975: Discouraged with music industry and
Vietnam War with funds dwindling, Zevon moves to Spain, lives and
plays music at Dubliner Bar in Stiges near Barcelona,
owned by former mercenary David “Lindy” Lindell, who
becomes songwriting collaborator
September 1975: Returns to L.A. after receiving
October 11, 1975: September 1975: Returns to L.A. after receiving
Lorne Michaels’ late- encouragement from Jackson Browne, who negotiates a
night satire Saturday major label recording contract for Zevon
Night Live premiers
“Live from New York . .
.” on NBC, with George
Carlin as guest host
May 18, 1976: Self-titled major-label debut album
produced by Browne on David Geffen’s Asylum Records,
receives rave reviews in the rock and popular press.
Linda Ronstadt records four songs from the album
July 1976: August 4, 1976: Daughter Ariel born
Celebration of U.S.
bicentennial
November 1976: Opens for Browne on nine-country
European tour
August 16, 1977:
Elvis Presley (allegedly)
dies in Memphis
November 1977:
Saturday Night Fever
soundtrack, a double
album of disco and Bee
Gees, stays at number
1 for 24 weeks,
remaining on the charts
for 120 weeks until
March 1980
January 18, 1978: Second Asylum album, Excitable
Boy, reaches number 8 with the single “Werewolves of
London” reaching number 21. Struggles with alcohol
escalate, leading to numerous episodes, interventions,
and revolving rehabilitations
May 22, 1978: Profiled in mainstream magazine
People
February 15, 1980: release of Bad Luck Streak in
Dancing School which includes excerpts from Zevon’s
unfinished symphony
August 1980: May 11, 1980: Appears on the King Biscuit Flower
United States boycotts Hour with Willie Nile
the Summer Olympics
in Moscow