Warren Zevon’s son isn’t sure how his late father would feel about finally getting inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. “By now he’d be 78,” Jordan Zevon tells Rolling Stone. “How would 78-year-old pop react to it? He could have been the crankiest, get-off-my-lawn-guy on the planet, or he might’ve morphed into the story-time grandpa with hard candy in his pocket and think it’s delightful. We just don’t know.”
Music fans love to complain about the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame’s many snubs, and acts like New Order/Joy Divison, the New York Dolls, Phish, Iron Maiden, Mariah Carey, and King Crimson are still not in. (Paul McCartney is hardly a get-off-my-lawn guy, but even the Beatle recently wrote a letter to the institution, urging them to induct the late Joe Cocker; it worked.) Zevon has famously been on that list of snubs for years — until now.
Decades before that title was claimed by Chappell Roan, Zevon was truly your favorite musician’s favorite musician. Just look at the list of all-stars who contributed to his self-titled classic in 1976: Glenn Frey, Don Henley, Stevie Nicks, Lindsey Buckingham, Jackson Browne, Bonnie Raitt, Phil Everly, and several others. That legacy has only grown in the 23 years since Zevon’s death, with younger musicians like MJ Lenderman and Shooter Jennings coming out as fans of the cult artist.
Jordan Zevon, a musician in his own right, was in his early thirties when his dad died from mesothelioma in 2003. He’s now 55, just a year younger than his dad at the time of his death. Before taking his daughter to see Thunderbolts*, he got on the phone with Rolling Stone to discuss the Hall of Fame news.
Congratulations. How did you receive the news?
Well, I had a little bit of an inkling ahead of time, because somebody called me to get a few quotes, but I kept it close to the belt. And then I knew it was going to be on American Idol, and I think that we had the basketball game on, because I didn’t realize that this was a full-on, live, coast-to-coast event. And so I’m just kind of working on my computer and I look up and the show’s on and I’m like, “Wait a minute.”
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You wrote on Facebook that people assumed you’d be disappointed about this, because he’s getting the Musical Influence Award (formerly the Early Influence Award), rather than being part of the main class of inductees.
To me, it makes perfect sense. I went and looked at the other people that were inducted in that: Hank Williams, Woody Guthrie, and Louis Jordan. And, I mean, Billie Holiday. It’s not really a shitty club, you know what I mean? I think that it acknowledges that he is influential, in the same way that I think people were a little shocked that he got as many fan votes as he did. There’s this undercurrent of his influence in a lot of musicians and a lot of people’s lives.
But no, he wasn’t like Cyndi Lauper. You didn’t see his videos every five seconds at the birth of MTV or anything, which is not to take away from any of the artists that were commercial successes. But I think that there’s a different kind of seeping into the roots of music that he did. And so I think it’s great. There’s no asterisk.
What does this mean to you on a personal level? Have you and your sister Ariel been talking about this for a long time?
We haven’t been talking about it for a long time. Before he was nominated, I really didn’t think it was going to happen. I didn’t know if he was going to be able to get on their radar enough for him to be included. So it was amazing when he got nominated [last year], and then he didn’t get in. And it was kind of like, “OK, yeah, I figured.”
And then when this happened, it was like, “That’s crazy.” I think the initial email I sent to [Ariel] is kind of funny. I should read what I sent to her, because what I said and what she responded was kind of classic. I wrote her an email that said, “Well, what do you know?” And she responded with, “Well, I’ll be.” [Laughs.]
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How do you think your dad would have reacted to the news?
I thought about it, and I’m going to give you a scoop. Because the talking point for me has basically been, he did like to be recognized, and he would have appreciated it. He has this reputation of anti-mainstream and anti-acclaim and anything, and that just really wasn’t the point. So myself and people that knew him know that he would’ve appreciated it, but the truth is, I don’t know. None of us know, because he’s gone.
Yeah, we just don’t know.
We don’t know. So as is the case when somebody dies, it’s really up to the rest of us to gauge how we feel about things. And I think that no matter what your opinion of the idea of a Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is, if somebody’s made it and there’s a big building that says Rock & Roll Hall of Fame on it, he should be in it, period. And now he is.
Your dad really was every musician’s favorite musician. I know that Billy Joel wrote a letter last year advocating for his inclusion in the Hall of Fame. So I’m curious, who’s reached out to you since the news came out?
I haven’t talked to a lot. I’d love for Billy to reach out. If you’re out there, you have my number. I’ve heard from the guys that he played with, and it’s the same thing. Everybody just thinks that it makes sense and they’re just happy to see that it’s happened and that he’s getting some recognition, because he had a tough career. It wasn’t always the easiest, but you’ve got to give him a lot of credit. He kept making great music, even if it wasn’t heard by as many people as it was in the heyday. It didn’t change his quality of music. He didn’t try to be anything other than what he was. And I think that that’s why you can look back on his catalog and just see that consistency.
Young musicians love him. Are you familiar with Weyes Blood or MJ Lenderman?
I know Lenderman. And then I also know Dawes. I know that they’re fans and they’ve done some really fantastic covers of his songs, which I really appreciate, because some of those songs were the ones that he was doing mostly on his own. I used to tell him, “Dad, I know musicians, they’ll play for free.” And he’s like, “Eh.” Of course, those guys are now the Wallflowers and all these other famous session guys. [Laughs.]
Lenderman has covered “Werewolves of London” several times, but after the Rock Hall news came out, he walked offstage in Brooklyn to “My Shit’s Fucked Up.”
That’s great. I know [Eddie] Vedder played “Keep Me in Your Heart” in Atlanta. I got sent a bunch of videos of that.
Tim Walz quoted your dad a lot during the 2024 election, saying “We’ll sleep when we’re dead.” Did you guys get to meet?
I know. That was crazy. I haven’t, but I did a Twitter post, or whatever it’s called nowadays, thanking him for being so supportive. One of my dad’s really close friends was [Tennessee] Congressman Steve Cohen, so he’s relayed it to Tim, that we appreciate all his support. Hopefully he’s excited.
It was great to see those Record Store Day releases — his 1990 album with R.E.M. [Hindu Love Gods] and the Nineties box set [Piano Fighter – The Giant Years]. I was really happy about the latter, because Mutineer is criminally underrated.
Yeah, it is. That was really great. A lot of that [was] Adam Unger, who is our web guy. He just has all these great ideas, so he really championed for that to happen.
Do you have other archival stuff in the works that you can share?
We’re working on something for the final three records [2000’s Life’ll Kill Ya, 2002’s My Ride’s Here, and 2003’s The Wind] and we’re also getting ready to work on something with The Envoy. That’ll have some live stuff and some other really, really cool stuff. If all the elements of it that we’re talking about come together, then I’m really excited for its release. And then we’ll break out the Record Store Day vinyl eventually, if you weren’t able to get the box set. Because I understand that those Record Store Day things can be kind of a nightmare.
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We’re a little ways out from the Rock Hall ceremony, but what’s your dream scenario as to how it goes down?
I don’t know. That’s not for me to say. I’ve heard names, I’ve heard ideas. Since I don’t work for them, I’ll kind of keep that to the belt for now. But it should be pretty cool.
They should definitely play “Join Me in L.A.,” since it’s so fitting.
Yeah, that would be perfect. It’s cool that the ceremony is in L.A. this year, because [he’s] Mr. L.A.
I’d obviously love to see David Letterman there.
Yeah, me too. It would make a lot of sense. He’s been really supportive. God, there’s a lot of people that have kept his legacy alive and been so kind and supportive, and I love it. At the very least, it’s hard to imagine that Dad wouldn’t be happy to still be talked about 20-plus years down the road. I told him I’d keep him busy, so here he is.
