Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner

Infobox Single
Name=Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner


Caption=
Type=
Artist=Warren Zevon
alt_artist=David Lindell
Album=Excitable Boy
Published=
Released=1978
track_no=2
Recorded=1977
Genre=Rock
Length=3:47
Composer=Warren Zevon
Label=Asylum
prev=Johnny Strikes up the Band
prev_no=1
next= Excitable Boy
next_no=3
Misc=

"Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner" is a song composed by Warren Zevon and David Lindell and performed by Zevon. It was first released on Zevon's 1978 album "Excitable Boy." It is the last song he ever performed in front of an audience, on the "Late Show with David Letterman", before his death in 2003. [cite episode
url = Youtube|WhRRWwH3Fro
title =
network = NBC
airdate = 2002-10-30]

About the song

Zevon met co-writer Lindell in Spain, where the latter was running a bar after a stint working as a mercenary in Africa. [ [http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/warrenzevon/articles/story/5935188/warren_zevon_on_the_loose_in_los_angeles Warren Zevon on the Loose in Los Angeles: Warren Zevon : Rolling Stone ] ] Typically interested in the darker side of life, Zevon decided to collaborate with Lindell on a song about a mercenary. Fact|date=September 2007

Roland is a Norwegian who becomes embroiled in the Congo Crisis of the late 1960s. He earns a reputation as the greatest Thompson gunner, a reputation that attracts the attention of the CIA. Roland is betrayed and murdered by a fellow mercenary, Van Owen, who shoots him in the head. Roland becomes the phantom "headless Thompson gunner" (reminiscent of the Headless Horseman) and eventually has his revenge on Van Owen, when he catches him "in a bar room drinking gin." After this Roland continues "wandering through the night" as a sort of revolutionary spirit.

Besides the historical references to third-world conflicts around the globe and the often shadowy involvement of the CIA, the song is a sort of bittersweet rallying cry to the "revolution" in America. The final line of the song, "Patty Hearst heard the burst of Roland's Thompson gun, and bought it..", referring to heiress Patty Hearst's kidnapping and subsequent involvement in the Symbionese Liberation Army, throws a cynical twist into the song's portrayal of a mercenary come back from the dead for justice and revenge.

Film Reference

The film has characters Nick Van Owen and Roland Tembo, as a tribute to the song. [cite web |title=Roger Ebert, December 27, 1998 |url=http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19981227/ANSWERMAN/812270304 |accessdate=7-05-2008]

References