26 August, 2003
Intimations of death were frequent in the work of complicated, brilliant Warren Zevon. His calling cards included I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead, Things To Do In Denver When You’re Dead and 1978 US hit Werewolves Of London; two recent albums were even called Life’ll Kill Ya and My Ride’s Here. But on this day, his final goodbye The Wind was released. An A-list guest-packed affair, it was recorded after he’d been given a terminal cancer diagnosis, and three months to live, on August 28, 2002.
Rather than go gentle, Zevon had decided to forego treatment and press on with an already-planned album with close creative partner and co-writer Jorge Calderón, who’d appeared on all but one of Zevon’s LPs since 1976. “He said, I wanna do what we talked about doing,” says Calderón, who co-produced with Zevon. “It was important to him to make the record. So there was really not a plan of, oh, we’re gonna write all these songs about mortality. He said, I want to leave my last message to all the fans, and for it to be successful, for my kids, so I can leave them something.”
On October 30 2002, he made his public farewell – he called it, “playing his own wake” - as the sole guest on his loyal friend David Letterman’s CBS TV show, performing and talking about his predicament with mordant wit. There were laughs, and a defining Zevon maxim when asked what his illness had taught him: “you’re meant to enjoy every sandwich.” The host later expressed regret at the interview’s playful tone.
Work on The Wind began in Los Angeles two weeks later, at studios including Sunset Sound and Cherokee. Sessions, and much else besides, would be filmed by filmmaker Nick Read for an edition of VH1’s (Inside) Out documentary series (it premiered on August 24, 2003). Friends including Ry Cooder, Emmylou Harris, Jackson Browne, the Eagles, Tom Petty, David Lindley, Jim Keltner and Billy Bob Thornton appeared contributing to the album: at a recording date in December, Bruce Springsteen played guitar and sang backing vocals on song of cheery collapse Disorder In The House. “He loved Bruce,” says Calderón. “He was so happy that Bruce flew to LA, in the middle of his tour, to do this. They hung, they had a great time… he was elated by all the great musicians being there.”
Laughs were abundant in the film, yet the reality of Zevon’s situation – he was taking liquid morphine while recording – was stark. A recovering alcoholic, he’d also started drinking again. Deeply depressed, Zevon would not return to the studio in 2003. “He just spiralled downhill over Christmas,” says his son Jordan. “I had to camp out for hours before he finally opened his door. It was dark, there were grocery bags all over the place with all the food in them, because all he’d been doing was taking the scotch out.” He pulled back and cleaned up with the help of his son, who says, “I think he instinctively knew that if he didn’t have something to work on, he was gonna go down that rabbit hole.”
“He told me he was scared and we both cried a little.”
Jordan Zevon
On April 12, having accepted medication, he was well enough to continue. Calderón and engineer Noah Scot Snyder went to Zevon’s Los Angeles apartment, where they recorded vocals for songs including the album’s final, poignant entreaty Keep Me In Your Heart. Earlier, Zevon had suggested Calderón sing it (“I said, ‘Are you fucking kidding me?’”). “I was there for the vocal recording of Keep Me In Your Heart,” says Zevon’s daughter Ariel, who was pregnant with twins at the time. “The image of him touching my stomach was on the same day… Once the album was recorded, honestly, he declined rapidly.”
On June 11, Zevon’s grandsons Maximus Patrick and Augustus Warren were born. His children and Calderón speak of a quiet retreat and loving last words. Jordan recalls them watching TV quiz show Jeopardy, enjoying laughs, and his father’s Jamaican nurses reading to him from The Bible: “He told me he was scared and we both cried a little.” Warren’s old road pal Jill Sobule has spoken fondly about “filthy” emails she received from him before he died on September 7, aged 56.
Reaching number 12 on the album charts the same month, in February 2004 The Wind won two Grammys. Once heard, its unflinching songs of life, death and the places in between are hard to shake off, like all its creator’s works. “He comes to my dreams,” says Calderón. “I wake up in the morning thinking, oh my god, he was still here, and we were doing stuff… I miss him every day.”