Excitable Boy
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Album Summary
Recorded in 1977 and released in January of 1978 on Asylum Records, Excitable Boy was the record that finally introduced Warren Zevon to the world the way he deserved to be heard. Produced by the masterful team of Jackson Browne and Waddy Wachtel, this album had the full weight of the Los Angeles rock royalty behind it — Don Henley and Glenn Frey of the Eagles, Lindsey Buckingham and Mick Fleetwood of Fleetwood Mac, all showing up to lend their talents to Zevon's gloriously twisted vision. Following his critically embraced self-titled debut, Zevon came back with something sharper, stranger, and undeniably more powerful — a record that proved his darkly comic songwriting could reach the masses without losing a single drop of its dangerous soul.
Reception
- Excitable Boy was a major commercial breakthrough, climbing to number 8 on the Billboard 200 and standing as the highest-charting album of Zevon's career.
- The single 'Werewolves of London' became Zevon's one and only top-40 hit, reaching number 21 on the Billboard Hot 100 and burning itself into the memory of every radio listener who caught it spinning in 1978.
- Critics embraced the album with genuine enthusiasm, celebrating Zevon's literary lyricism and his fearless genre-blending as the mark of one of the most distinctive and original voices to rise out of the California rock scene.
Significance
- Excitable Boy cemented Warren Zevon's singular identity as a songwriter willing to drag dark, violent, and macabre subject matter right into the heart of a radio-friendly rock arrangement — a balance of menace and melody that few before or since have managed with such effortless grace.
- The album stands as one of the defining documents of the late-1970s Los Angeles rock scene, a testament to the extraordinary collaborative spirit that flourished around Asylum Records and the tight-knit community of musicians who made that era so rich and so alive.
- With tracks ranging from the howling absurdity of 'Werewolves of London' to the aching tenderness of 'Accidentally Like A Martyr,' Excitable Boy demonstrated that Zevon contained multitudes — and in doing so, helped carve out a tradition of literate, emotionally complex rock songwriting that would inspire generations to follow.
Samples
- Werewolves of London — sampled prominently by Kid Rock in 'All Summer Long' (2008), one of the most commercially visible uses of a Zevon composition, bringing his legacy to an entirely new generation of listeners.
Tracklist
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A1 Johnny Strikes Up The Band 118
2:49
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A2 Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner 81
3:47
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A3 Excitable Boy 122
2:40
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A4 Werewolves Of London 103
3:27
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A5 Accidentally Like A Martyr 71
3:37
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B1 Nighttime In The Switching Yard 112
4:15
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B2 Veracruz 96
3:30
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B3 Tenderness On The Block 98
3:55
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B4 Lawyers, Guns And Money 96
3:29
Artist Details
Warren Zevon was a brilliant, darkly witty Los Angeles singer-songwriter who emerged in the mid-1970s with a sound that blended rock, pop, and folk into something that felt like Raymond Chandler writing a hit record — equal parts gorgeous and dangerous. His 1978 breakthrough "Werewolves of London" made him a household name, but cats who really knew their music understood that albums like *Excitable Boy* and *Warren Zevon* were packed with cinematic storytelling and razor-sharp lyrics that made him one of the most distinctive voices of his generation. He never quite fit the mainstream mold, and that's exactly what made him a legend — a true artist's artist who earned deep respect from peers like Jackson Browne and Linda Ronstadt, and whose final album *The Wind*, recorded as he faced terminal cancer in 2003, stands as one of the most profoundly moving swan songs in the history of American music.
