Warren Zevon and Elvis

The manner of Elvis' demise bugged Warren Zevon; enough so that he wrote a song about it. From "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead," longtime friend and collaborator Jorge Calderon tells the story:

Jorge Calderon:

Another day, I took an old notebook out. I had glued this postcard from Graceland on it and it had a picture of Elvis' TV room, and it had like three TVs. And on the coffee table there was this white, weird-looking monkey with black eyes. He said, "What is that?" I said, "Look, it's a porcelain monkey." And, he just wrote it down and underlined it and said, "That's the next song."

I had seen this movie about the Memphis Mafia guys talking about how they couldn't do anything to help Elvis because they would lose their jobs. So, after he dies, these guys are doing a documentary about how they couldn't help him, but they do a movie about his death, and Warren loved that concept. At one point, I said, "He was an accident waiting to happen..." He wrote that down and then he added, "Some accidents happen at home." Then he wrote, "He should've gone out more often. Maybe he should have answered the phone." Then, later I said - I thought this would be too much - "Hip shaking..." Then, the second verse, which is my favorite, we wrote in front of each other at his house.

He was an accident waiting to happen
Most accidents happen at home
Maybe he should've gone out more often
Maybe he should've answered the phone

Hip-shakin' shoutin' in gold lame'
That's how he earned his regal sobriquet
Then he threw it all away
For a porcelain monkey
He threw it away for a porcelain monkey
Gave it all up for a figurine
He traded it in for a night in Las Vegas
And his face on velveteen

From a shotgun shack singing Pentecostal hymns
Through the wrought iron gates to the TV room
He had a little world, it was smaller than your hand
It's a rockabilly ride from the glitter to the gloom
Left behind by the latest trends
Eating fried chicken with his regicidal friends
That's how the story ends
With a porcelain monkey

He threw it away for a porcelain monkey
Gave it all up for a figurine
He traded it in for a night in Las Vegas
And his face on velveteen

Hip-shakin' shoutin' in gold lame'
That's how he earned his regal sobriquet
Then he threw it all away
For a porcelain monkey

He threw it away for a porcelain monkey
Gave it all up for a figurine
He traded it in for a night in Las Vegas
And his face on velveteen

- Porcelain Monkey, Warren Zevon and Jorge Calderon