Tag: Poor Poor Pitiful Me

I love this song. Not many songs deal with a failed suicide, domestic abuse, and a brush with sadomasochism. I’m a huge Warren Zevon fan. His songs tend to be on the dark side…and anyone who has listened to Excitable Boy will testify to that.

When I heard Zevon’s version of this song for the first time I was sold. I first heard the Linda Ronstadt version and I loved it. I’m a Linda Ronstadt fan but something about Zevon’s version draws me in. It’s raw and crude and I love the way he sings it.

Zevon wrote and recorded the song and it appeared on his self-titled album in 1976. It became a hit when Linda Ronstadt covered it the next year. She cleaned up the song a little. Ronstadt’s cover was a cleaned-up version with the gender reversed. Still, her character fails at suicide, but the S&M (sadomasochism) references are gone.

Like other Zevon songs this is a pretty crude and risqué song. His character is such a disaster that he can’t even kill himself: he puts his head on the railroad tracks, but the train doesn’t run anymore.

I met a girl at the rainbow bar
She asked me if I’d beat her
She took me back to the hired house
I don’t wanna talk about it, hut

It’s thought that the song was a friendly swipe at Jackson Browne, whose songs such as “Here Come Those Tears Again” and “Sleep’s Dark and Silent Gate” from The Pretender could be quite dark. The album was produced by Jackson Browne and had backing vocals by Lindsey Buckingham.

Another hit cover version of the song was recorded by Canadian country singer Terri Clark in 1996. It peaked at #1 in the Canadian Country Charts and #5 in the Billboard Country Charts.

Poor Poor Pitiful Me

I lay my head on the railroad tracks
I’m waiting on the double E
The railroad don’t run no more
Poor poor pitiful me

Poor poor pitiful me and poor poor pitiful me
These young girls won’t let me be
Lord have mercy on me, woe is me

Well I met a girl in West Hollywood
Well I ain’t naming names
But she really worked me over good
She was just like Jesse James

She really worked me over good
She was a credit to her gender
She put me through some changes Lord
Sort of like a waring blender

Poor poor pitiful me, poor poor pitiful me
These young girls won’t let me be
Lord have mercy on me, woe is me

Poor poor pitiful me and poor poor pitiful me
Oh these girls won’t let me be
Lord have mercy on me, woe is me

I met a girl at the rainbow bar
She asked me if I’d beat her
She took me back to the hired house
I don’t wanna talk about it, hut

Poor poor pitiful me
Poor poor pitiful me
Hut, never mind
Poor poor pitiful me
Yeah poor poor pitiful me