NEW YORK -- Warren Zevon exploded on the late '70s pop scene like a supernova.
The brilliant and unpredictable singer-songwriter unleashed five albums of furiously intelligent rock 'n' roll between 1976 and 1982, building a catalog of classic songs like 'Werewolves of London,' 'Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner,' 'Excitable Boy,' 'Lawyers, Guns and Money' and 'The Envoy' in the process.
Zevon's fire was fueled in part by an alcoholic death-grip that sidetracked his career and nearly destroyed his life as well. He managed to kick the habit and slowly build his way back toward recording with a series of solo live performances.
Now Zevon has come all the way back with his first album in five years and a supporting tour. The album, 'Sentimental Hygiene,' is his strongest work ever, a remarkable collection of songs backed by luminaries such as Neil Young, Bob Dylan and members of R.E.M. His comeback completed, Zevon is back out on the road with a full band.
Several songs on the record, particularly 'Detox Mansion' and 'Trouble Waiting to Happen,' deal bluntly in Zevon's tragi-comic writing style with the problems that have kept his career on the shelf. 'Detox Mansion,' written with Jorge Calderon, makes you laugh and flinch at the same time.
'Let's put it this way,' Zevon said shortly before the tour's start. 'I think Jorge and I wrote a song that anyone who reads magazines could understand. It's not essentially a funny issue, in fact it's a life and death issue for me, but there's always an occasion for humor. I figure it's not a bad thing if I'm the brunt of the joke. I guess I'm making the assumption that people will know I've been through this experience.
'It has more to do with the way I write songs than having an impulse to self expostulation,' he explained. 'A slogan or a phrase or a couple of words come to mind and I write a song to justify singing them over and over. I never start off with the intention of writing about my own problems or Third World politics.'
An item in Rolling Stone magazine prompted Zevon to write 'Trouble Waiting to Happen.'
'I read in a box like an obituary that I had been dropped by my record company,' Zevon said. 'Up until that point I thought I had been granted a release. It was brutal. J D Souther was with me at the time, I turned to him and said J D, this does not bode well for the immediate future of my career.'
Zevon got to work with some of his favorite musicians on the new record. Bob Dylan showed up unannounced to play harmonica on 'The Factory.'
'I came to the studio one day,' Zevon recalled, 'and the receptionist said 'Bob Dylan is waiting.' He said 'I like your songs,' and I said 'I like yours too.' He heard of me through T Bone Burnett.
'There was some weird, cryptic message from Dylan through T Bone, but I didn't realize he was going to come to the session. I played him the stuff we were working on. At the end of 'The Factory' one of the engineers understood him to say 'hmm ... asbestos,' then he sat back down.'
Neil Young played the guitar solo on the title track.
'I found myself on the phone with Neil Young,' Zevon said. 'He came down and played. It was one of the most exciting and gratifying moments for me. We rolled in his stage rig and he took off. Watching him from 4 feet away was just like seeing him onstage.'
Much of the album was recorded with a rhythm section of R.E.M.'s Peter Buck, Mike Mills and Bill Berry.
'As far as new groups went I was quite fond of them,' Zevon said. 'They knew my stuff, we had jammed together in Athens, Ga., where they're from, and I had played with them in L.A. We had it in mind that they'd help me with my next album.'
One of the album's best songs is a fascinating tribute to the lightweight boxer Ray 'Boom Boom' Mancini. Zevon writes about boxing with tremendous empathy, implicitly turning Mancini's struggles into a metaphor for larger conflicts.
'On one level I liked his name and could imagine myself singing it over and over,' he laughed. 'I think less in terms of saving the world than how many consonants does it have. I'm real good with consonants.'
Zevon went on to admit that 'Boom Boom Mancini' is his favorite song on the record. 'My father was a prizefighter,' he said. 'It became a romantic idea in my mind. I did feel sympathy for Mancini. We got to be friends since the record came out.'
