A Quiet Normal Life: The Best of Warren Zevon
AMG AllMusic Guide: Pop Albums:
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A Quiet Normal Life: The Best of Warren Zevon
- Artist: Warren Zevon
- Rating:
- Release Date: 1986
- Total Time: 46:59
- Type: Compilation (best of)
- Genre: Rock
Review
Warren Zevon's body of work is a good bit more diverse and intelligent than you might imagine if you only know his music from the radio; while his relative hits ("Werewolves of London," "Excitable Boy," "Lawyers, Guns and Money") play more like novelty songs than anything else, his best albums display a melodic sophistication that never gets in the way of his desire to rock out, and a lyrical perspective that's unusually literate, witty, and brutally cynical. As one might expect, A Quiet Normal Life: The Best of Warren Zevon focuses on the artist's best known stuff from his tenure at Asylum Records, and leans more towards "Crazy Warren" tunes (like the above-mentioned trio) over superior if more difficult material like "The French Inhaler" or "Frank and Jesse James," with no rare or unreleased material for completists. It doesn't even honor the hits as well as one might hope (the remastering is a bit on the flat side, and "Lawyers, Guns and Money" appears in a radio edit that deletes the final verse), and there isn't a single song from Stand in the Fire, Zevon's superb live album. But you do get the most famous songs, which are invariably worth hearing (his own hits and a couple tunes that were made famous by Linda Ronstadt, though "Hasten Down the Wind" is curiously absent), along with a few pleasant surprises, including the incendiary "Play It All Night Long" and one of Zevon's finest meditations on life in L.A., "Desperados Under the Eaves." A Quiet Normal Life: The Best of Warren Zevon will satisfy those with a casual interest in the artist, but for a better one-stop introduction to this songwriter's body of work, try I'll Sleep When I'm Dead (An Anthology). ~ Mark Deming, Rovi| A Quiet Night in a Hectic Space (2006 Album by Jeff Shew) | |
| A Quiet Passion (2006 Album by The Ken Myers Project) |
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| A Quiet Normal Life: The Best of Warren Zevon | ||||
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| Greatest hits album by Warren Zevon | ||||
| Released | October 24, 1986 | |||
| Recorded | 1975-1982 | |||
| Genre | Rock | |||
| Length | 46:59 | |||
| Label | Elektra | |||
| Producer | Warren Zevon, Jackson Browne, Waddy Wachtel, Greg Ladanyi | |||
| Warren Zevon chronology | ||||
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A Quiet Normal Life: The Best Of Warren Zevon is a greatest hits album by Warren Zevon released in 1986. Warren Zevon's second album (his first, Wanted Dead or Alive, appeared in 1969) Warren Zevon included three songs "Hasten Down the Wind", "Carmelita" and "Poor Poor Pitiful Me", that gained popularity from Linda Ronstandt's cover versions. Zevon's second album, although it achieved critical acclaim and sold better than his solo debut, lingered at the bottom of the pop charts. Warren Zevon finally broke through with the song "Werewolves of London" from his second album Excitable Boy. Although Excitable Boy sold well, Zevon had a difficult time capitalizing on the success of the album. The follow-up album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School features Zevon's cover of Ernie K-Doe's "A Certain Girl" and while the single did chart, it was not included on A Quiet Normal Life. Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School peaked at #20.
Later albums fared even worse with the album The Envoy peaking at #93 in the Billboard Charts. That album is represented here by three songs including "Looking for the Next Best Thing". Zevon's last album under his Warner contract was represented by this Best of collection, mastered by Barry Diament. This set was superseded in 1996 by I'll Sleep When I'm Dead, a 2-disc anthology of hits, album tracks and rarities and, later, by a single disc Genius: The Best of Warren Zevon.
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Contents
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Reception
| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic |   [1] |
Track listing
All songs written by Warren Zevon unless otherwise indicated.
- "Werewolves of London" (LeRoy Marinell, Waddy Wachtel, Zevon) (from Excitable Boy, 1978) – 3:29
- "Excitable Boy" (Marinell, Zevon) (from Excitable Boy, 1978) – 2:39
- "Play It All Night Long" (from Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School, 1980) – 2:50
- "Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner" (David Lindell, Zevon) (from Excitable Boy, 1978) – 3:47
- "The Envoy" (from The Envoy, 1982) – 3:12
- "Mohammed's Radio" (from Warren Zevon, 1976) – 3:41
- "Desperados Under the Eaves" (from Warren Zevon, 1976) – 4:45
- "Johnny Strikes Up the Band" (from Excitable Boy, 1978) – 2:48
- "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead" (from Warren Zevon, 1976) – 2:56
- "Lawyers, Guns and Money (Radio edit)" (single, 1978) – 2:56
- "Ain't That Pretty at All" (Marinell, Zevon) (from The Envoy, 1982) – 3:34
- "Poor Poor Pitiful Me" (from Warren Zevon, 1976) – 3:04
- "Accidentally Like a Martyr" (from Excitable Boy, 1978) – 3:39
- "Looking for the Next Best Thing" (Kenny Edwards, Marinell, Zevon) (from The Envoy, 1982) – 3:39
Certifications
| Organization | Level | Date |
|---|---|---|
| RIAA – U.S. | Gold | December 4, 1998 |
References
- ^ Deming, Mark. "A Quiet Normal Life: The Best of Warren Zevon - Warren Zevon". AllMusic. http://www.allmusic.com/album/a-quiet-normal-life-the-best-of-warren-zevon-r22689. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
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