Saturday, October 19, 2013

Life'll Kill Ya

Warren Zevon had a simply elegant way of summarizing life.

He put out an album in 2000 titled "Life'll Kill You". I was digging on that album on the way to The Asylum this morning - in fact I have been digging on it all week long.

A lot of death references on the album - he was often referred to as dark, which is a reference often attributed to me. Although I have always said and will continue to say until my corpse is kicked into the grave and covered with dirt - I am not dark, I am realistic.

I bet Warren would concur.

I am foggy on the Warren Zevon death timeline - I assumed he knew he was going to die when he recorded this.

Nope.

He wasn't diagnosed with cancer until 2002. And he was only given months to live.

The title song is direct: "Life'll kill ya, that's what I said, life'll kill ya, and then you'll be dead, life'll find ya wherever you go, requiescat in pace, that's all she wrote."

That's the chorus.

"From The President of The United States to the lowliest rock 'n roll star, the doctor is in and he'll see you now, he don't care who you are, some get the awful, awful diseases, some get the knife, some get the gun, some get to die in their sleep at the age of a hundred and one."

"Maybe you'll go to heaven, see Uncle Al and Uncle Lou, maybe you'll be reincarnated, maybe that stuff''s true, if you were good maybe you'll comeback as someone nice, and if you were bad maybe you'll have to pay the price."

Pretty simple lyrics but it is stuff we all think about. How complicated does it have to be?

Got another song on the same album titles "Don't Let Us Get Sick."

The chorus goes: "Don't let us get sick, don't let us get old, don't let us get stupid, all right? Just make us be brave and make us play nice, and let us be together tonight."

Sensitive, pretty song guaranteed to bring tears if you are up in age. Maybe if you are young.................and sensitive and aware.

Warren's last album was titled "The Wind". It was released two weeks before his death. Got a song on there called "Keep Me In Your Heart."

Achingly beautiful and deeply meaningful from a man who knew absolutely that he would be dead soon. Recording the album was difficult for the man. He had fallen off the wagon when he was diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer. He was drunk. He was dying.

I love the picture on the album cover because it is Warren with no pretense. He looks awful.

"Shadows are fallin' and I'm runnin' out of breath, keep me in your heart for a while, if I leave you it doesn't mean I love you any less, keep me in your heart for a while.

Sometimes when you're doing simple things around the house, maybe you'll think of me and smile, you know I'm tied to you like the buttons on your blouse, keep me in your heart for a while.

Hold me in your thoughts, take me to your dreams, touch me as I fall into view, when the winter comes keep the fires lit, and I will be right next to you."

I can't get through that song with dry eyes. If you can, you are not human.

Anyway.......... I was driving directly into the fires of Hell this morning and it hit me.

Listening to Warren brought me a great deal of peace. I was singing, I teared up here and there, I was focused on the music and my emotions and Warren's emotions, and not on the cretinous morons who's singular goal it is to kill me prematurely (?).

Yet Warrens life was a turbulent one and his death a hideous one.

How does this stuff work?

He was a tortured soul. A disoriented soul? Is there a difference? I don't know. His loves, his actions, his career, his relationship to his kids, it was all up in the air.

He churned out crazy music, sensitive music, interesting music and intelligent lyrics. That music brought me peace today at the almost tail end of a miserable week.

Day 6, of 9 consecutive at Lompoc.

The man suffered. He was confused. He created. He aroused emotions and reactions.

At what cost?

Should I feel some guilt to smile or cry along with his songs knowing how turbulent his life was?

I don't know. I don't know a goddamn thing.

Except that I am proud to dig Warren Zevon. Proud to dig one more guy that superficial people might easily dismiss.

People who think all he was is "Werewolves Of London."

Get your shit together, people and "enjoy every sandwich."


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