More than anyone else in the whole El Lay songwriter movement of the late seventies, Warren Zevon had absolutely no problem with getting a good laugh at the expense of the insularity of it all. And on his second proper album, he took the whole scene and turned it properly on its backside. "Excitable Boy" threw in a mix of werewolves, mercenaries, drug abusers and paranoid spoiled brats, yet while frequently offering exceptional tenderness and insight. It was easy to see why Jackson Browne was his mentor and Linda Ronstadt his patron angel.

A song as reckless as the album's title track could come from nothing less than genius. The chirpy sweet background vocals and sugary melody buoy the dark tale of a murderous high school student who kills on the night of his junior prom. "Hotel California" this most certainly wasn't. At the same time, "Accidentally Like a Martyr," with its stately piano line, encompasses the horror of a sunken love affair in barely three and a half minutes. These juxtapositions carry all the way through "Excitable Boy," with only one misstep in the CD's nine songs (the forced funk of "Nighttime In The Switching Yard").

Warren Zevon made several other great albums, but "Excitable Boy" was the moment that his youthful exuberance and a mind uncluttered by too many foreign substances produced a stunner. As a document of the California Sound that Elektra/Asylum records was known for in the seventies, this is indispensable.

The remaster is stunning. The piano to "Accidentally Like A Martyr" just leaps out of the mix (where before it seemed kind of flat). The same can be said for "Nighttime In The Switching Yard." What originally sounded compressed now sounds so much livelier. The bonus tracks are only so-so, with the alternate take of "Werewolves" being somewhat interesting and "I Need A Truck' humorous but unnecessary. What you really want here is the original album, and "Excitable Boy" is worth the remastered wait.

When I was a college freshman in 1984, my next-door neighbor was a sophomore who would blast this album almost every day, and scream the lyrics to every song along with Warren Zevon. Within a few weeks I was singing out loud along with both Warren and my neighbor (I knew the words by heart already). When Christmas vacation came, and I had time to do something other than study, this album was my first purchase. I loved it the first time I heard it (in chorus...), and I love it today. It's irony, humor, politics, lyrics, melodies... make it just as brilliant and worthwhile today as it was more than twenty years ago.

I love all the songs, but agree with the reviewer who said that "Night Time in the Switching Yard" is the only weak song on the CD. In "Excitable Boy," I always laugh at the juxtaposition of the line "and he raped her and killed her, then he took her home" and the "sing songy" way in which the line is sung.

I would recommend this CD to anyone, especially those who appreciate great lyrics and the macabre.

Thanks, Jim, wherever you are, for introducing me to this album.

An excellent remaster of Warren Zevon's consistently good 1978 album. Sound quality is much improved, and it's worth having for the alternate version of 'Werewolves of London' alone. It sounds like the guys (Mick Fleetwood and John McVie included) are having a bloody good time, belting out the whacky gem, in what sounds like a studio run-through.

Recommended.

If ELTON JOHN had an evil twin, it would have been Warren Zevon. A

great lyricist who sang with a snarl, Warren would sing about the glass

half empty. Mercenary ghosts, werewolves, compulsive killers, rich kids

in trouble on foreign shores, Warren painted a canvas on the dark side

of life. Every song is great on this CD, no filler on the original

tracks, this was his masterpiece.... Werewolves of London, Excitable

Boy, Johnny Strikes Up The Band, Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner,

Lawyers, Guns, & Money, Accidently Like A Martyr, were brilliant songs.

His songs were funny, twisted, cynical; like dry ice sitting in a glass

of expensive wine, meant for a select audience who shared a secret with

him. Warren you will be sorely missed.

Zevon become famous with "Werewolves of London," a satirical critique of the world's womanizers (past and present), but as true Zevon fans know, there was much more to this man than "aaaaaoooo, werewolves of London" and a three-chord progression that is as infectious as it is cutesy. The true Warren Zevon was a poet of sorts, a man who tackled difficult subjects ("Excitable Boy," for example, with a final verse that still gives me shivers), but still remained a sensitive man at heart ("Accidentally Like a Martyr," for example; don't deny, it moves you).

From the you-know-what hitting the fan in "Lawyers Guns and Money," to the purely delightful recitation of "I Need a Truck," to the heart-wrenching "Tule's Blues," to the rockin' romp of "Nighttime in the Switching Yard," to the world's most famous undead Thompson-gun toting anti-hero in "Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner," EXCITABLE BOY remains a rock 'n roll classic. In fact, I'd go so far as to say it's a staple rock album. It is by far wittier and more creative than most rock albums ever produced; sure, there aren't too many screaming electric guitars (oh my God, is that guy playing a PIANO???), but EXCITABLE BOY is quite simply one of the best rock albums ever made. Warren Zevon was a folk/rock artist like none before him...and, it's safe to say, like none we will ever see again.