After a rather well-publicized fall off the wagon following the release of
The Envoy,
Warren Zevon went five years without releasing an album, but his time in the woodshed seemed to have done him good, as
Sentimental Hygiene was his strongest album since
Warren Zevon in 1976. While a few members of the L.A. Mellow Mafia (
David Lindley,
Waddy Wachtel,
Don Henley) made cameo appearances on the album, for most of the sessions
Zevon worked with
Peter Buck,
Mike Mills, and
Bill Berry of
R.E.M., who were about a year away from their mainstream commercial breakthrough; they made for a solid, no-nonsense rhythm section and gave the music a passionate, forceful backbone that was largely absent from
The Envoy (not to mention rocking harder than one might expect from the kings of
jangle pop).
Zevon put his newly muscular sound to good use; the songs on
Sentimental Hygiene are
Warren Zevon at his flintiest, as he indulges in his usual obsessions with machismo (
"Boom Boom Mancini") and bad love (the title cut) while also exploring the media's skewed perspective on his addiction problems (
"Detox Mansion," "Trouble Waiting to Happen"), his disgust with the music business (
"Even a Dog Can Shake Hands"), and errors in both personal and political judgment (
"Bad Karma," "Leave My Monkey Alone"). And
Zevon scored three inspired musical guest shots on the album --
Neil Young, whose jagged guitar runs embroider the title cut;
Bob Dylan, whose howling harmonica is the ideal punctuation for the
Springsteen-gone-psychotic
"The Factory"; and
George Clinton, who adds a bed of menacing
funk to
"Leave My Monkey Alone." Sentimental Hygiene proved that
Warren Zevon was still an artist to be reckoned with, and that which didn't kill him had only made him stronger (and more bitterly funny). [In 2003,
Sentimental Hygiene was digitally remastered and reissued with two bonus tracks: a previously unreleased Spanish-language version of
"Leave My Monkey Alone" and the brief
avant-garde instrumental "Nocturne."] ~ Mark Deming
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