A farewell tour
Diagnosed with terminal cancer, Warren Zevon says goodbye in a bracing new album and TV special
When Warren Zevon was given three months to live after doctors diagnosed inoperable lung cancer last summer, some people assumed he might head to Mexico to hide out and sit on a beach. Quite the opposite happened. Although long known as a clown prince of rock 'n' roll, Zevon suddenly got serious and became determined to make one last album. "In the time I have left, I want to record as many songs as fast as I can," Zevon said back then. "It's the best way I can think of to say goodbye to my friends and kids."
Thus began a courageous journey that eventually pulled in such guests (and friends) as Bruce Springsteen, Jackson Browne, Emmylou Harris, Dwight Yoakam, Don Henley, Tom Petty, and Ry Cooder. Although Zevon suffered from shortness of breath and later had to finish the record in his home studio, he succeeded heroically in making "The Wind," to be released on Tuesday.
Rock performers have often overcome loss in public -- think of AC/DC, Lynyrd Skynyrd, the Pretenders, and Boston's own Morphine, all of whom lost key members to unexpected tragedy. But rarely has an artist turned a life-threatening disease into such a crowning masterpiece. Former Beatle George Harrison succumbed to cancer last year while making the CD "Brainwashed," which was finished by his son Dhani and friend Jeff Lynne. But Zevon was able to see his project through to completion.
In a strange irony, Zevon, 56, has written satirically about death throughout his three-decade, 14-album career. Back in 1976, he released the song "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead," with the line "It don't matter if I get a little tired, I'll sleep when I'm dead." And just three years ago, before his diagnosis, he made the album "Life'll Kill Ya" at Cambridge's Fort Apache Studio. Zevon is still alive as of this writing to see the release of "The Wind." It's a superlative exclamation point to a long and tangled career that has featured such rock classics as "Werewolves of London," "Excitable Boy," "Poor Poor Pitiful Me," and "Lawyers, Guns and Money." Together they cemented Zevon's image as an irreverent maverick who answered to no one.
"The creativity kept him going. I think it kept his immune system alive," says the new album's producer and frequent Zevon song collaborator Jorge Calderon. "He was totally a trouper right from the beginning of it . . . and I think the record is just so honest and so full of feeling."
And it's so Zevon. The wry, iconoclastic singer kicks it off with the autobiographical "Dirty Life & Times," about how "it's hard to find a girl with a heart of gold when you're living in a four-letter world." Then, in the rollicking "Disorder in the House," which features a Jeff Beckian guitar solo by none other than Springsteen, Zevon asserts of America: "It's the home of the brave and the land of the free/Where the less you know, the better off you'll be."
And in a striking acceptance of his plight, he follows with Bob Dylan's "Knockin' on Heaven's Door," with its prophetic verse "Mama, put my guns in the ground/I can't shoot them anymore."
"A friend of Warren's suggested that he do the [Dylan] song, and at first I was opposed to it," says Calderon. "But Warren thought it was like nailing it in the head. And I think he wanted to tip his hat to Dylan, too. We cut the song in Billy Bob Thornton's studio, and we had the ex-drummer from the Black Crowes, Steve Gorman, on it. And Jackson Browne was there and Tommy Shaw [of Styx] and John Waite. We sat around playing some pool, and then we got together and did a very spiritual version of it."
Zevon skillfully avoids falling into bathos on the new disc. He uses it as an opportunity to sum up a crazy, cataclysmic life that saw his escape from alcoholism (he quit drinking in 1980, but that didn't tone down his lyrics) and many romantic ups and downs.
The new song "She's Too Good for Me" (with Henley on harmony vocals) is about a Puerto Rican woman he lived with for seven years who was the love of his life, says Calderon. And piano ballad "Please Stay" (with Harris on backup) is dedicated to his current girlfriend, Kristen. "Please stay -- two words that I thought I'd never learn to say," Zevon sings.
There are other powerful songs, such as "Prison Grove" (a metaphor for Zevon's illness and the way he feels trapped by it) and "Numb as a Statue," in which he sings, "I may have to beg, borrow, and steal some feelings from you so I can have some feelings too."
But there's also the irrepressibly funky "The Rest of the Night" and the swamp-rock of "Rub Me Raw," with Joe Walsh playing guitar and Zevon belting, "I'm a shattering mess, but I'm going to stand up and take it with class." And the CD ends with the poignant "Keep Me in Your Heart," with its touching message "When you get up in the morning and you see that crazy sun/Keep me in your heart for a while."
"Warren thought that song might be too much a case of `cry for me,' but I think it came out great," says Calderon, who says his toughest chore during the recording process was knowing when to push Zevon and when not to.
"The problem was his stamina," he says. "He still had a voice and could sing, but you had to catch him at the right time."
The making of the album and Zevon's struggle with cancer are detailed in a new VH1 documentary, "Inside Out: Warren Zevon," which debuts tonight at 10. If you're a Zevon fan, you'll want to tape it as a keepsake of his stubborn grace under pressure.
For example, he is shown entering the backstage door of the "Late Night With David Letterman" show last fall and shocking a TV crew by saying, "Dead man walking." And on the show, he jokingly tells Letterman, "I guess I made a tactical error by not going to see a physician for 20 years. It was one of those phobias that didn't pay off."
"My hat is off to Letterman," says Calderon. "He had Warren on for the whole show. And you know he had to tell [the network], `Look, I'm going to have to put off startlets No. 1 and 2 tonight because I want to have my friend on.' Nobody else would have done that. Letterman has a heart."
The documentary induces tears when Zevon is shown leaving the Letterman taping. Before he gets into a car, he shakes hands with a cluster of fans who know they might be saying their final goodbyes. It's an outpouring of grief that is mesmerizing.
There are also some heavy moments when Zevon meets with his oncologist and when he complains to Calderon during the taping of one studio track that he just can't do it anymore that night. But there are also some very happy times, notably when he's at the piano with his son Jordan, 34, or when his face lights up when Springsteen blows in to sing backup and play guitar on "Disorder in the House."
"Bruce called and said he wanted to be involved on the album," says Calderon. "He was in the middle of a tour, but he charted a plane to come to LA for just five or six hours. . . . He played one-take stuff. It was blam-blam-blam, just total energy and joy. He played some real feral rock 'n' roll, almost punk. When we asked him where he learned to play like that, he said, `I started as a lead guitar player.' The whole thing was great for Warren. It was a boost, and he really needed that."
These days, Zevon is not able to do interviews because of his deteriorating health. "He's basically taking it easy and watching a lot of cable movies," says his son. "He has no more objectives to his work. He has worked very hard for most of his life, so for him to be able to say, `Son, why don't you do some interviews?' is a nice change of pace." (Zevon's other child is Ariel, who gave birth in June to twin boys, Augustus and Maximus; Zevon was able to visit them in the hospital.)
Asked about his own feelings in the last year, Jordan, who runs a guitar amplifier company in LA, says, "It's been a little bit of everything. Sometimes it's hard, sometimes it's therapeutic. But I'm certainly proud of my dad as a father and an artist. He's been an unbelievable dad."
Jordan, who sings some backup on the new song "Prison Grove," obviously didn't have a typical childhood. He recalls at age 8 being asked by Zevon if he'd like to sing backup on "Werewolves of London." Jordan said no but recalls, "My musical tastes evolved pretty rapidly after that. And I always got what my father was doing."
Zevon's gallows humor is captured in the VH1 documentary when he says, "I've dramatically outlived the predictions of the doctors. I'm beginning to feel like a fraud!"
That's one thing Zevon could never be. Listen to "The Wind" and you'll immediately hear why.
