“Enjoy every sandwich”
- Warren Zevon
Christmas, if you haven't noticed, is just around the corner. Retailers have made that a selling point for a couple of months now. But first we have Halloween and Thanksgiving to get through. Halloween, unlike Christmas, is not blessed with a long playlist of songs celebrating its existence. There are literally (I use that word properly) 50,000 songs that fall under the category of Christmas. You could name 25 right now off the top of your head. How many Halloween songs do you know? That's right, two - Monster Mash and Werewolves of London. I don't know the origin of Monster Mash, but Werewolves was not written with Halloween intent; it was just a goof.
It's one of fate's little jokes that some brilliant musicians and songwriters get saddled with one novelty song as their legacy (Loudon Wainwright III, Dead Skunk, anybody?). Such is the case with Warren Zevon and Werewolves of London. He was a songwriter's songwriter, brilliant, clever and sardonic. But if I were to go out to the Springfield-Branson Airport right now and ask one hundred people who Warren Zevon was, of the six who knew, five would say he's the guy who sings Werewolves of London; the sixth would say that plus Lawyers, Guns and Money. Life ain't fair, somebody said. No one would know Poor, Poor Pitiful Me or Desperados Under the Eaves. I'd take that bet.
When Zevon's professional music career was just getting rolling in the early 1970s, he signed on as keyboard player and band leader for the Everly Brothers on tour. It was Phil Everly in 1974 who suggested that Zevon write a song that might spark a dance craze, like Monster Mash had a few years before. Everly had watched a 1935 movie one night on TV called the Werewolves of London and he mentioned it the next day as a possible idea for a tune. “Why don't you do that, Warren?” Warren wasn't keen on the idea then.
A few months later, Warren and his wife Crystal were hanging out at their friend and LA neighbor, LeRoy Marinell's house. The idea resurfaced in Warren's head and he decided to amuse LeRoy with a silly werewolf dance he'd thought up. They were in the midst of goofing around with it when their friend and everyone's favorite guitar player, Waddle Wachtel walked through the door and said, “What are you guys doing?" Warren said, “Were doing the Werewolves of London.” And Waddy immediately responded, “You mean, Aah-Ooh! Werewolves of London?” “That's right,” Warren said, and they all sat down and wrote the song in fifteen minutes, trading absurd lines back and forth.
The next day, Warren stopped by his friend Jackson Browne's place and played a bit of the new song for him. Jackson loved it so much he added it to his live set list. Warren eventually concluded that he ought to use the song for something, so he decided to get a definitive recording and put it on his second album, Excitable Boy. Getting the right feel he wanted proved elusive. Various ensembles of musicians gave it a go but things never jelled. Finally, Mick Fleetwood and John McVie from Fleetwood Mac were recruited, and they along with Wachtel and Zevon recorded 60 takes. They decided to use the second one. That's what you hear today.
Warren called Werewolves “a dumb song for smart people” and lamented at times that he hoped he wouldn't have to be singing the stupid thing every night in Las Vegas when he was old. That didn't come to pass. He died from mesothelioma in 2003 at the age of 53. If you're unfamiliar with the body of his work, I encourage a listen. It's music for smart people.