{"id":954247,"date":"2026-05-12T06:28:37","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T06:28:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/954247\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T06:28:37","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T06:28:37","slug":"warren-zevons-werewolves-of-london-became-a-hit-after-15-minute-writing-session","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/954247\/","title":{"rendered":"Warren Zevon’s ‘Werewolves of London’ Became a Hit After 15-Minute Writing Session"},"content":{"rendered":"

Years after his death, Warren Zevon<\/strong> was described by Bob Dylan<\/strong><\/a> as a “musician’s musician” (and a “tortured” one at that). Dylan’s admiration for Zevon is so great that he’s even covered some of the late Rock and Roll Hall of Famer’s songs live, including \u201dAccidentally Like a Martyr,” “Lawyers, Guns and Money” and “Mutineer” \u2014 but he apparently never performed his own version of Zevon’s biggest hit of all time, “Werewolves of London.”<\/p>\n

Interestingly enough, Zevon himself was surprised when “Werewolves of London” was a huge success. As George Plasketes<\/strong> wrote in Warren Zevon: Desperado of Los Angeles<\/a>, the song started out as a joke<\/a>: After watching the 1935 movie\u00a0Werewolf of London\u00a0on late-night TV, Phil Everly <\/strong>suggested Zevon write a song inspired by the film. Zevon took the idea to LeRoy Marinell <\/strong>and Waddy Wachtel<\/strong>, both members of his band, and the trio wrote “Werewolves of London” together in a 15-minute session.<\/p>\n

Zevon, who later called the track a “dumb song for smart people,” didn’t want “Werewolves of London” released as the debut single from his 1978 album, Excitable Boy, but the record label insisted…and the decision paid off.<\/p>\n

“Werewolves of London” (which happens to feature Fleetwood Mac’s Mick Fleetwood<\/strong> and John McVie<\/strong> on drums and bass, respectively) became Zevon’s only top 40 hit, peaking at #21 on the Billboard Hot 100. In 2004, BBC Radio 2 <\/a>listeners ranked the track as having the “best opening song line” of all time:<\/p>\n

“I saw werewolf<\/a> with a Chinese menu in his hand \/ Walking through the streets of SoHo in the rain \/ He was looking for the place called Lee Ho Fooks \/ For to get a big dish of beef chow mein”<\/p>\n

Warren Zevon thought of ‘Werewolves of London’ as a sort of ‘novelty’ song<\/p>\n

Years later, Zevon called “Werewolves of London” a novelty song, but “not a novelty the way, say,\u00a0Steve Martin<\/a><\/strong>‘s ‘King Tut’ is a novelty.”<\/p>\n

He also took issue with the public perception that “Werewolves of London” was massively successful, saying, “I don\u2019t think it was as big a hit as people think it was.”<\/p>\n

“People remember it from year to year more \u2014 it\u2019s been in movies<\/a> and it gets trotted out regularly \u2014 but it\u2019s not as if it sold four million copies, like a Paula Abdul <\/strong>single, you know what I mean?” Zevon quipped.<\/p>\n

It might not be “Opposites Attract,” but “Werewolves of London” is definitely one of the funniest and most beloved songs in rock history.<\/p>\n

Related: 1970 One-Hit Wonder Ranked Among ‘All-Time Hottest Songs of Summer’ Took 10 Minutes to Write<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

This story was originally published by Parade<\/a> on May 12, 2026, where it first appeared in the Entertainment<\/a> section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Years after his death, Warren Zevon was described by Bob Dylan as a “musician’s musician” (and a “tortured”…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":954248,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7757],"tags":[39538,748,393,4884,257,16,15,266340,266341,266339],"class_list":{"0":"post-954247","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-london","8":"tag-bob-dylan","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-london","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom","15":"tag-werewolf-of-london","16":"tag-werewolves","17":"tag-werewolves-of-london"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116560194005423234","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954247","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=954247"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954247\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/954248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=954247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=954247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=954247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}