Typical backstage nightclub dive dressing room with the scribble on the walls, graffiti of all the rock stars who probably weren’t really any more than rock star wannabes, and I said, “Warren, you were great.” He said, “I’m just the organ grinder’s monkey.” I said, “Why do you say that?” He said, “Ack, this is no way to make a living.” I said, “Warren, you were great. Really great.” Slowly he responded a little, saying, “Well, they did like that one song.”
March 16, 2000—New York
…Dr. Sandy & Madeline, Mike & Polly and none other than Peter Asher were at the show. It went fine, at least until the yelling started and the fight broke out. Is everybody happy?
March 28, 2000—Los Angeles/House of Blues
…Sound check. Susan arrived. Then, Ariel (really beautiful), Ben and a very slim and attractive Crystal, Jordan with friends, Jackson (telling me about Mali before the show), Jorge sporting a short George Cloony haircut with Yvonne…After the show hectic then settled down to the kids, Crystal, Jackson, Dianna, Calderons & Susan. Very nice night.
April 10, 2000—Memphis
…Went over to Senator Steve’s. Krumper: Late Show, yes; band, no. Went to Graceland. Called Klook Mop from the TV room a few feet from the porcelain monkey. Personal favorite, a small, stone outbuilding with a man-sized target & a Lucite box of sport casings where “Elvis & the guys had target practice.” I said, “So this is Elvis’s point blank firing range.”…On the way to the club, I learned they wanted off the hook due to lack of ticket sales. Cancelled. I was in the café & spotted this in last Friday’s Commercial Appeal: Kieslowski’s Decalogues coming out on DVD! Happiness finally restored. Steve’s chum, Cybil Shepherd, stopped by.
DANNY GOLDBERG: The people from the promotion departments who would go on the road with him would always be amazed at how other artists would always want to get some music to listen to, but Warren always wanted to go to a bookstore. That was always part of what he needed to do on his way to a radio station or an interview.
May 8, 2000—Belgium
…Checked out after a pleasant walk around the Brueghel-like town. They let me stop at Sterling English-language book store. Then to TV Belgium Late Show: The host, Bruno, was delightful. “Was that okay?” I asked, innocently after some feisty banter. “It was perfect!” he said, patting my hand. Arrived in London. The Sanderson’s weird, self-consciously postmodern, of course. The lobby’s stupid but the candlelit, draperously-curtain room’s nice.
CARL HIAASEN: When he went to England, he had Susan meet him there. I thought he was going to take her along and he said, “No, no. She’s going to meet me for four or five days.” He was very excited that she was going to be there for the period she was going to be there. But not on the whole tour.
SUSAN JAFFY: When I first arrived, he was standing in the lobby with a big smile on his face. But, he had a hard time because they had him doing all these interviews every day. He had to be on constantly, so he was in a pretty foul mood. It was stressful for him to let anyone spend the whole night with him. Usually, at two in the morning whoever he was with would leave. So, spending the week with him in London was a big deal.
BONNIE RAITT: I hadn’t seen Warren in quite a long time because I moved up to Northern California. Between our separate recording and touring careers, I was out of the L.A. loop. Of course, the minute he had a new record out, I’d snap it up. Jackson and I are very close, so we’d always talk about where Warren was and what he was doing.
Then, I ran into him in, of all places, Dublin, and he had a really bad cold and was worried about being able to sing that night. Luckily, I had some medication for just that emergency and he was able to get through the show.
May 22, 2000—Dublin
…Something told me to find a church. I walked right in on a mass in progress, left $100 in the poor box & prayed to sing. It was very bright outside & I felt light. Bonnie suggested remedies for must-sing circumstances…The show was good: I know why. Peace be with you.
BONNIE RAITT: He was playing solo and using delays and pedals and doing solos with himself. I had never seen anybody do that before. His ferocity knocked me out. I hadn’t seen him solo, or in so many years, or sober, and that performance floored me. On top of that, the body of work that he had, his spirit and vulnerability, his absolutely hysterical brilliant wit and the power of his songs. Warren was one of our greatest artists. It was very apparent that he was at the top of his game.
June 29, 2000—Letterman Show
…When they brought me down, George Clooney was waiting to meet me. “I’m a huge fan,” he said. He told me when he first drove to L.A. he had one tape—mine…How splendid just before my number.
July 1, 2000
…Susan over. At leaving time, she announced she was thinking of artificial insemination. I suggested, in the nicest possible way, that she walk out the door and start dating in earnest first! Well. Stan’s prediction was perfectly accurate. So let it be written.
SUSAN JAFFY: We broke up a million times and it was always about the baby thing. We never stopped having sex. Ever. Never. It was a problem, because I’d be dating other people. When we didn’t see each other it was because I knew if I saw him I’d have sex with him, and I was trying to make something work with someone else. But, we never ever got together and didn’t have sex. Maybe one time, but I don’t think so.
PETER ASHER: I produced the redone version of “Back in the High Life.” It was Danny Goldberg who thought he could get some airplay if it was commercialized a bit. I straightened it out a bit timewise and put some drums on it. I thought it was odd to be pursuing Warren with a non-Warren song. But, he did it beautifully and I guess they got some mileage out of it, but it didn’t become a hit. But, I loved doing it.
DANNY GOLDBERG: Life’ll Kill Ya was an extraordinary record. I still am frustrated that we didn’t do better with it given how good it is. He worked very hard; he toured a lot and the company worked hard. It was one of our first releases and we got him a lot of interviews, and we ended up selling around 70,000 copies. At that time VH1 was doing that show Behind the Music and I did everything I could to convince them to do one on Warren, and they wouldn’t do it, which is ironic given that they ended up having that big special on him when he was dying. I always felt a little irritated that we couldn’t have gotten that kind of exposure on Life’ll Kill Ya, which, I think, is every bit as good as The Wind.
July 20, 2000
…Lunch with Danny Goldberg. I like him. He takes little notes whenever you tell him you want something!
MITCH ALBOM: One time he talked about writing a song together that had to do with sports. He said, “Nobody ever writes anything about sports. You should write me a sports song.” I said, “You’re the songwriter.” He said, “Ah, come on. Let’s collaborate.” He had been nudging me about it because he had a new album coming up, so I said, “Alright, how about hockey? No one ever writes a song about hockey.” He said, “Whatever.”
So, I came up with the lyrics for a song about a hockey goon who just went around and beat people up. He gets to the last game of his life and has a chance to score an actual goal. Anyway, I sent the lyrics to Warren and, five minutes later, he calls me up. He says, “This is great. This is great. We have to record this.” I said, “Well, it was just an idea.” He says, “No, no. We have to do this.” I said, “Alright. I’m coming out to L.A. next week anyway. We’ll get together.”
August 22, 2000
…Dinner of Zen with Mitch, Janine, her pretty sister & nephew. Nice time: love Mitch.
MITCH ALBOM: He came down to Laguna Beach. He was in a gray T-shirt, gray pants, gray sneakers, and he was carrying a six-pack of Mountain Dew and a guitar. I had a piano, and we sat down in the basement and came up with melodies to go with these lyrics. Warren put a little of his Zevon-esque touch to the lyrics…the first line is “He was born in Big Beaver by the borderline…” Warren said, “I love saying all those B’s. Let’s put ’em in there.” I remembe
r asking, “Does this really rhyme?” He said, “I can make anything rhyme. Are you kidding? Just get it close and I’ll make it rhyme.” All the things you associate with songwriting that you think have to be so exact, he says, “Come on. It’s rock and roll. We can rhyme ‘thanks’ with ‘mom.’ I’ll make it work. Don’t worry.”
We sang it, and the hook was “What’s a Canadian farm boy to do?” As if a big Canadian farm boy has no alternative in life except to become a goon. He was singing it over and over, “What’s a Canadian farm boy to do?” Then, somebody would yell, “Hit somebody!” That’s what the song ended up being called, “Hit Somebody,” because there is always this guy who sits right in front of me at games who, when things get slow and he gets bored, just stands up and screams at the top of his lungs, “Hit somebody!” That’s what hockey is. When things get boring, start a fight.
August 26, 2000
…Went to Crystal’s fundraiser for Ariel’s David Mamet play. For all my protests, it was a foregone conclusion I’d attend. Seek large gathering of your ex-wife’s friends…Jackson sang “Next Trick,” Jennifer Warnes’ voice still moves me, Ariel’s “Oleanna” co-star, Miguel Perez, did an excellent monologue then Ariel and her women’s theater company “Toxic Shock Stage” did a long skit which she wrote. It was great; the whole crowd laughed uproariously.
September 13, 2000
…Chris called from Letterman Show—suddenly Shaffer’s able to make it to the Gore show but wants me to sit in. I tell them I’m uncomfortable with that. I call Danny at home & he said, “Fuck them…Isn’t it nice when we agree?” The kids were supportive. Carl said, “You’ll hate yourself—you’ll feel like a Jack Russell terrier humping Shaffer’s leg.” Of course, Steve argued that I should do it, as did Mike. Went to bed disappointed but resolved. Resigned?
September 14, 2000
…Dave called. We chatted at length, then he told me he was sensitive to the reason why I didn’t want to “sit in”—I said, “What am I going to do? Hump Shaffer’s leg like a Jack Russell terrier?” Dave loved that. He said he’d explain—he’d make me “a hero”—“If I’m not being presumptuous, you’re one of the family,” he said it was a big show, it would mean a lot to him—of course, I agreed. And, of course, it was fun, although I didn’t rate so much as a glance from the Vice President. Letterman made a speech as good as his promise.
September 15, 2000
…Pilot Studios for “Hit Somebody” with Anton, Sid, Shaffer & Tony Levin. I demanded a piano tuner—it was tuned last night—after the tuner left, Tony tells us the piano’s 442 so Shaffer can’t play organ on the track! In the end, we got a great track, overdubbed organ & I bullied Krumper into shipping the multi to Jackson’s studio (where I hoped to add Crosby & possibly Gretusky).
PAUL SHAFFER: It was great to be in the studio with him and it was very easy. Anton had worked with him before, so he and Anton were comfortable with each other, and because the studio was so small, he decided I should put my organ part on after rather than play it live with the band. I sat in the booth, and he looked to me to let him know if it was a good take or not. Of course, by the second or third take they had it, but it was fun to be in the control room and him saying to me, “What’d you think?” It was very clear, very simple. He did it quickly and easily. No frills.
He was very concerned about what Mitch Albom, his co-writer, would think. He said to me, “This guy is not easy to please.” Then, he was very happy and proud when Mitch liked it. He told me that Mitch liked it and that’s what was important to him. Then he produced me on the organ, trying to evoke a hockey arena organ sound, as well as a type of organ that might be on a Warren Zevon album. We wanted to combine those two things, and I think we got it.
MITCH ALBOM: I never thought that anything would come of that song. It was just a fun thing for a couple friends to do together down in the basement one night. So, I go on a vacation with my wife and we are in the Cook Islands about four hours north of New Zealand in this tiny little hotel. In the middle of the day, the phone rings and it’s Warren. It’s a terrible connection, and he said, “I want to know if I can change one of the words in one of the lines of the song.” I said, “From what to what?” He says, “You know, from ‘a’ to ‘the.’” Something like that. I said, “Sure, fine. Where are you, Warren?” He said, “We’re in the studio.” I said, “What studio?” He said, “I’m in New York with Dave and some of the guys.” I said, “Dave who?” He says, “Dave Letterman and Paul Shaffer. We’re all in here.” I said, “You’re recording that song?” He said, “Well, Mitch, what do you think we wrote it for?” In that typical sardonic, you know, “What do you think we wrote it for? To read it?”
He had the whole band in there and they were recording it, and the first I even learned that he planned on recording it was when he called me from the studio. Needless to say, I said, “Whatever you want to do, sure. Go ahead.” I didn’t even hear it until I came back from this trip, and it ended up on his album My Ride’s Here. The postscript is that the song became a little bit of a hit. It’s kind of a novelty song, and Canadian stations started playing it, and hockey cities started playing it, and then they started playing it in Joe Lewis Arena here in Detroit where the Redwings play. They play it over the loudspeakers during the game.
Warren ended up going on the David Letterman show and performing the song. On the record where he sings, “What’s a Canadian farm boy to do?,” he got Letterman to be the crazed fan of my life—and David Letterman screams, “Hit somebody!” You hear it on the record, over and over. I had fulfilled a bit of a fantasy with him and I’m always grateful to him for writing a rock and roll song and getting it on a rock and roll record, albeit as a hockey song. He was proud of that.
October 11, 2000
…Dave recorded his “Hit Somebody” great…This is fabulous. Crosby left a message at Morgan’s that they’d “hit pay dirt” in the studio—“I thought I could do it, but I can’t.” Musicians. That’s why I play alone.
JON LANDAU: “The Hockey Song”…We’re managing this pop rock band called Train who have been quite successful. They’re pretty knowledgeable about music, but there are gaps. I’m always trying to play them things that were before their time as I drift into old age myself. I put Warren’s song on in my car and the lead singer just convulsed with laughter. He just could not believe it. He said, “That is the funniest song I’ve ever heard.” I mean that’s a masterpiece, that thing.
January 24, 2001—54th Birthday
…Lindy’s [David Lindell, co-writer of “Roland, the Headless Thompson Gunner”] widow, Lisa, sent his obituary and a wonderful letter. I thought a lot about him and the old days in Spain all day.
Alongside Hunter Thompson, Warren became a co-spokesperson for a cause that fit the Zevon paradigm. He signed on to play a role in the “Free Lisl” press conference and rally held on the Colorado State Capitol steps on May 14, 2001.
May 12, 2001
…Hunter’s film chronicler woke me from a happy nap…They sent HST’s ESPN column for Monday. Hunter praised my newspaper quote, but later had to add, “He’s a whole different person when he’s scared.” Brilliant bully.
May 17, 2001
…breakfast with Sheriff Bob and Louisa. Bob took me in his office, shut the door, took a badge out of his desk drawer and swore me in!
PART FOUR
Don’t Let Us Get Sick
ONE
MY SHIT’S FUCKED UP
Well, I went to the doctor
I said, “I’m feeling kinda rough”
He said, “Let me break it to you, son.
Your shit’s fucked up.”
YVONNE CALDERON: Maybe a year before his diagnosis, I watched Warren on the Letterman show and I told Jorge, “You have to get Warren to a doctor right away.” Jorge says, “Why?” I said, “Because he’s very sick. Look at the way he looks.” Jorge says, “I just saw him. He’s fine.” I’m going, “Jorge, I swear to you, please.”
I’m a very dramatic person and I was telling him he had to tell Warren, to the point that he was getting angry with me. He’s going, “Don’t be so intense. I’ll tell him to go to the doctor.” The next time he saw him, he told him, “Listen, Yvonne says that you have to go to the doctor right away. You know, she’s good at that stuff.” Warren said, “Okay, I’ll go to the doctor.” This went on for I don’t know how many more months.
DANNY GOLDBERG: He was nervous about whether or not I would want to make a second record. It was an easy decision to me because he’s a brilliant guy and our whole model was to work with people who were really talented and the budgets were not all that high. And so he told me he was making what he called his “spiritual” album—dripping with irony but meaning it at the same time. That was My Ride’s Here. That record has some great songs on it, but I found it a little less focused as a record.
He was very effective performing solo, but when this album was done, he decided he couldn’t do any of those songs without a band. He wanted us to subsidize the tour and economically that didn’t make any sense. As a little company, we couldn’t do that. You know, at the memorial service, Jackson said that anyone who was ever friends with Warren had had a falling out with him at one point, so that was my falling out with him. He was very upset with me that we wouldn’t subsidize his tour.
NOAH SNYDER, engineer: I met Warren when he upgraded his home recording stuff to be computer stuff…Pro Tools. Warren was a super genius, but I wouldn’t call him technical. We did not like each other when we first met at all. He thought I was a hotshot, punk kid who didn’t give a damn about him or anything else besides getting my party on Friday night.
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