Warren

We Hated The Word "Genius" and Loved The Job Story

In writing the pieces for this medium I am trying to find territory that is personal in a way that might be interesting to readers, and is not being written about by others in a fresh and eloquent way. A real challenge, as Substack has become a home for so many incredibly talented and gifted writers in these times where it is so difficult for them to disseminate their work, and to be compensated for it. There are so many things that compel me in this time, whether it’s the political situation, where we face the looming specter of a man being elected president of the United States who is so clearly intent on governing as a dictator, who confesses an admiration for Adolf Hitler, and who is using a playbook right out of the Nazis’ road to power in the thirties, or the rampant anti-semitism and ignorance in what I think of as The Age Of No History.

In the unusual and circuitous life that I’ve had I’ve been extraordinarily fortunate to work with artists, musicians, and songwriters who occupy the very top stratum of their craft. I’ve chosen to explore my personal experiences borne of my work and friendship with some of these giant talents.

Mutineer

In 1994 I was called by Warren Zevon to come in and play bass on some tracks that ended up being a part of the album that he called “Mutineer”. Warren was already one of my favorite songwriters, so the prospect of playing on some things that he was working on was exciting to say the least. I ended up playing on two songs, “Rottweiler Blues” and “Mutineer” that day. As a producer, Warren pretty much gave me a free hand in how to approach what I played on those songs, and they both were wonderful examples of his personal combination of the touching and poignant, and sarcastically funny way of writing songs. Warren was very proud of the fact that he had collaborated on one of the songs with another of my favorite writers, Carl Hiaasen.

I’ve found that there are times in my life where I immediately have a bond with with people. The longer that I’ve occupied what Gore Vidal described as “this vale of tears”, the clearer that it has become to me that you can know that you have this kind of bond with a person very quickly. The connection is sometimes known even before you speak to each other; a glint in the eye of the other person, the shape of their smile, the way that they shake your hand. There is just a sense of common perspective that is felt. Miles Davis said that he could tell how someone played by seeing the way that they carried their instrument. Warren and I both had this feeling when I walked into the studio to play on his songs.

As we worked on the songs, we began a dialog that was to last for years. We shared a distinctly dark point of view on the human condition in general, and a similar trajectory in our lives in some ways. We had both studied traditional music theory at a young age, as well as a passion for and study of compositional techniques of Contemporary “classical” music. He had actually had some lessons with Igor Stravinsky at a very early age, and I had studied harmonic analysis and composition with Dr. Wayne Bischoff, who was the music teacher at my middle school and high school, and was a disciple of Gerald Strang, who was a student and protege of Arnold Schoenberg. We both had strange aversions to certain words, and a tragically comical view of the search for the right woman to be with for the “long haul”. I had somewhat recently come out of a 10-year marriage, and was in a consistently problematic on and off and difficult relationship, and he was wandering his way through the netherworld of single life in Los Angeles. By this point he had given up drinking, drugs, and had made his way out of some of the most dramatically crazy period of his life, and was simply plagued with rampant and severe OCD, and the darker aspects of the part of his personality that he called “The Mormon Punisher”.

We immediately launched into a friendship in which we spoke at length on the phone every day, and at his urging, decided to try collaborating on some songwriting. Warren was at a point in his writing and life where he loved to collaborate on songwriting. Perhaps he always loved to collaborate. Songwriting is a lonely pursuit, and there is something that is fun and a great way to avoid the more painful and unpleasant aspect of the process in collaboration.

A Song: Sacrificial Lambs

The first time that we got together to write we decided that we wanted the musical aspect of the first song to be extremely simple in a “rock and roll” sense; something that had the feeling of J.J. Cale, who we were both big fans of, and Z.Z. Top, who we were both also partial to in regard to their simple and direct musical syntax. We decided to write the song about the question of Jesus and a prescriptive God. Obviously a big crowd-pleaser! The first verse that we wrote was:

We’re Having a party, we’re burning it down, we’re building an idol, he’s sad, but he don’t frown

He’s the cream of the crop, so we’re making him God, start writing this down when I give you the nod…

Them Coptic monks, knew how to keep it real, that Rosicrucian thing, that Zoroastrian thing,

Well they might be wrong, they don’t give a damn, long as they don’t run out of sacrificial lambs

Then, the chorus that we came up with was:

Eat my dust, and I’ll clean your clock

Eat my dust, and we’ll reel and rock

Eat my dust, and I’ll be your man

You can be my Sacrificial Lamb

I don’t know if I’ve ever laughed as hard as I did when writing with Warren. I find that my favorite way to write is when the song emanates from conversation, and both Warren and I were quite skeptical about the idea of a God that is prescriptive, who sees or hears requests, and responds. The Job story came to mind.

I have been a fan of the philosopher and speaker J. Krishnamurti at times, and have read many of his transcribed talks. When we met to write this song, I happened to be reading a book called “Lives In The Shadow Of J. Krishnamurti”, which is a book about the dark side of Krishnamurti, and was written by the daughter of his editor. The verse that popped out was:

Madame Blavatsky, and her friends, changed lead into gold, and back again, Krishnamurti said, “I’ll set you free, write a check, and make it out to me”

We had a great time making the song center on a question as timeless and ineffable as “what is the nature of God” wander around with the slacker’s voice in an absurdist fashion; setting up the exposition of a knucklehead narrative, then suddenly resolve with God’s definitive response, speaking in the dim protagonist’s own style. The rest of the song continues in this absurdist syntax, which was a delightful mode to work in with Warren. We both loved this way of approaching a Big Question. The narrator continues by complaining:

Take a look, at my family tree, Every brother and sister, wants something for free, You get what you pay for from me, my friend, nothing for nothing, forever, amen!

After a reiteration of God’s response, we let our pop-conscious absurdist have the floor again:

Smokey and The Bandit, and Saddam Hussein, were staying up late and acting insane, Along with Russell Crowe and Hafez Assad, Start taking this down when I give you the nod!

The boys are all ready, they’ve laid out the plans, they’re setting the stage, for the man-made man, We’ve worked out the kinks in your DNA, So sayonara kid, Have a nice day!

Then we have our God respond again:

Eat my dust, And I’ll clean your clock, Eat my dust, and we’ll reel and rock, Eat my dust, And I’ll be Your Man, You can be MY Sacrificial Lamb!

The idea of writing a moronic reduction of a Job-like dialog was something that we both delighted in.

Stories

Hunter

From time to time Warren would call me and begin the call in a hushed whisper. I would begin talking to him, as we both updated each other with various romantic misadventures, and ideas regarding a variety of themes that were consistent touchstones for us. At a certain point I would always inquire “Warren… why are you whispering?…” and he would respond “I’m at Hunter’s house…”, which meant that he was staying at Hunter S. Thompson’s house in Aspen, Colorado. We were both very big fans of Hunter’s writing, and Warren knew that at this point in his life, almost anything could set Hunter off, with him flying into a rage that might end up with some sort of volatile gunplay. The funniest aspect of this ritual for me was that it always was exactly the same; as if he had never told me about staying at Hunter’s house.

The Birthday Present

One birthday, I received a package from Warren. When I opened the parcel, he had sent me a copy of Martin Heidegger’s book “Being In Time”. If you haven’t had the misfortune to read Heidegger, “Being In Time” was basically a chest-crushing 700 page treatise on question of whether we are actually here or not. Aside from being one of most un-readable books ever written, it benefited from being written by a philosopher who became a Nazi during WWII. I have no idea why Warren would have chosen this bleak and unreadable book for my present, as I was absolutely certain that he had never read it.

Years later, after Warren had passed away, I had come out to our mutual friend JD Souther’s little farm outside Nashville to do some writing and pre-production for what became the album “Tenderness”, that JD and I did together. JD was a big reader, and both of our houses were filled with bookshelves packed to capacity. As I wandered down one of his bookshelves I came across …. “Being In Time” by Martin Heidegger! I yelled to JD, who was in the kitchen, “JD! Where the hell did you get this book from, and have you read it??” He stuck his head out of the kitchen, looked at the book, and replied “Hell no!… Warren gave it to me for my birthday!”

Another Song: Genius

Another thing that Warren and I had in common was a distaste and loathing for the word “Genius”. We both felt that it was one of the most over-used words in the English language, and shared a shuddering response to when we encountered it to describe someone who almost certainly didn’t deserve this status.

I had just come out of an ill-fated romantic adventure with a woman that we comedically dubbed “The Sensible Choice”. Without going into too many specifics, I was the one who was left. (it’s always one person or the other, right?), so I was free to indulge in a good-sized helping of self-righteous anger and frustration. We got together one day to write, and decided to write a song that emanated from our shared annoyance with the word “Genius”:

The first verse sets the song up, with an exposition that centered on the narrator’s anger at the woman who had dumped him for another suitor, and the suitor himself:

I’ve got a bitter pot of je ne said quoi, and guess what, I’m stirring it with a monkey’s paw

Since I saw you coming out of my barber’s shop, in that skimpy little halter top

Did you light the candles? Did you put on “Kind Of Blue”? Did you use that Ivy League voodoo on him too?

He thinks he’ll be alright, but he doesn’t know for sure, like every other unindicted co-conspirator

Then we switch gears into the somewhat schizophrenic alternate narrative for the chorus. We enjoyed working with this detached way of approaching the verse-chorus structure, partially because it kept us laughing, and partially because we felt it was an effective way to come at things; non-literal and somewhat sideways:

Mata Hari had a house in France, where she worked on all her secret plans

Men were falling for her sight unseen,

She was a Genius

From there we thought that we would talk a bit about how competitive the songwriting world was. Also part of the picture in our shared feelings about how mediocrity was consistently elevated, with the purveyors being labelled as “geniuses”. The schizo approach affords one much freedom:

There’s a face in every window of the Songwriter’s Neighborhood, Everybody’s your best friend when you’re doing well,.. I mean good. The poet who lived next door when you were young and poor, grew up to be a backstabbing entrepreneur…

Then back to the central point of things, but coming at it with the voice of the knucklehead Herodotus character:

Albert Einstein was a ladies’ man, while he was working on his universal plan, he was making out like Charlie Sheen, he was a Genius…

Then back to our bitter lovelorn guy:

When you dropped me and you staked your claim, on a V.I.P. who could make your name, You latched on to him and I became a minor inconvenience…

Your protege, he don’t care about art, I’m the one who always told you you were smart, You broke my heart into smithereens, and that took Genius..

Then we make our V.I.P. into blend into the barber that we introduced early-on:

You and the barber make a handsome pair, guess what, I never liked the way he cut your hair, I didn’t like the way he turned your head, but there’s nothing I can do or say that I haven’t done or said..

In conclusion, we have the protagonist (us) take responsibility for the whole mess:

Everybody needs a place to stand, and a method for their schemes and scams, If I could only get my record clean, I’d be a Genius

The Brilliance Of Warren

Writing with Warren was a liberating education in many ways. As I said earlier, he thrived on collaboration, so I know that I’m not alone in feeling this way; Warren was a great writer and co-writer in a distinctly liberating way. He taught me things that are difficult to quantify and describe, but one thing that I can articulate is that he showed me that you can be well-served to inhabit thoroughly disturbed and unlikeable characters in songwriting. It was a similar lesson that I learned every time I listened to one of Randy Newman’s great albums, but somehow writing with Warren made the lesson come alive for me. In our friendship and the work that we did together, I was the lucky one. I was able to play ping-pong with a true master, and enjoy a beautiful friendship at the same time.