Jonathan Richman

photos by Alissa Anderson, interview by Jeremy Crown.
(an abridged version of this interview appears in the Fall 2004 issue of Herbivore.)

Jonathan Richman is in complete control of the situation: the dingy dimly lit venue, the standing sweaty faithful, and the sound guy, wherever the hell he is. The mics are turning on and off like a kid messing with a light switch, but Jonathan is still singing, no longer in front of the microphone but playing to the crowd. Onstage at the Make Out Room in San Francisco’s Mission District, Jonathan seems at home; dancing with his flamenco guitar off to the side, his left hand down by his leg with his palm out and fingers extended. He really is shaking his hips, like some sort of invisible hula-hoop. The man’s on fire, almost literally; it’s like 100 degrees in this place because he doesn’t want the fan on while he’s playing because of the noise. I don’t blame the guy, but my shirt is sticking to my chest. Somehow, his shirt is still separate, almost loose-fitting. From all the dancing, I guess. It’s no sweat for Jonathan though, he’s been at it for thirty years. Jonathan started playing music at age sixteen in and around Boston, spurred on by his heroes The Velvet Underground. Three years later at age nineteen he formed the Modern Lovers and recorded a demo with The Velvet Underground’s John Cale, unknowingly setting the stage for what would be a new way of looking at music: punk rock. Those years also marked a less publicized milestone—after talking to a rock club janitor he had befriended, he became vegetarian, a decision he has stuck with ever since. In the intervening years he has toured the world many times over and released almost two dozen albums, the most recent of which, this year’s Not So Much To Be Loved As To Love (Vapor/Sanctuary), is one of his best. Those not familiar with his storied career may at least recognize him as the balladeer in the Farrelly Brothers’ romantic comedy There’s Something About Mary, where he and his longtime drummer Tommy Larkins set the scenes with musical commentary and, ironically, play hot dog vendors at one point.
The first time I met Jonathan, in my little shop in San Francisco, he was humming a single note while his wife tried on shoes. I remember he was eating a vegan donut and after he finished, walked over to me and said, “So what do you think of Matt Gonzalez?” (Matt is the President of the Board of Supervisors in San Francisco and was the Green Party Mayoral Candidate at the time.) Jonathan had publicly supported Matt, playing a show as a fundraiser for him. We talked about the mayoral race and the current president and other political issues, themes that continue to this day between us. He’s a very political guy but not in any way that is very public. He may say things during one of his shows, like on the Take Me To The Plaza live DVD (Vapor) in which he talks about the war in Iraq. But his first real overtly political song comes on his new album with “Abu Jamal,” a slow pump organ-driven track about the imprisoned writer who has incited an anti-death penalty movement. Jonathan seems to be the type of guy that really stands for things and believes in them and is willing to go Downtown and flyer for them. At the same time though, he’s not a rigid dogmatist; rather his ideology is optimism. He believes in life being beautiful and maybe a little tragic; whether it’s “Springtime in New York,” “Lilies of the Field,” or “Dancing in a Lesbian Bar.” The beauty is there and in front of us all, it just takes Jonathan to remind us, to sing it in our ear (maybe in Spanish, maybe in Italian). Sitting in my shop again on a brisk San Francisco summer day, we talked about the politics of life and speaking for those who cannot speak: the animals, the glass bottles, the bowls of oats. And like the man says, if you’re ever in a jam, “just add raisins and you’re livin’ like a king.”

Being Vegan

Zum: Do you identify yourself as a vegetarian?
Jonathan Richman: It’s a great question. Right now I identify as vegan. I’m not strict, 100%. Every once in a while in some country, someone’s mother will make somethin’ and I’m not gonna ask grandma...you know like she’s there, she’s got her apron on and she spent four hours and I’m a guest at her house. I’m not gonna say, “Excuse me is there oleo Margarine and is there hydrogenated this-and-that. Nah, I eat somethin’. You know, I do the best I can. (laughs). Left to my own devices I’m mostly a vegan.
We can talk about how it is traveling and staying vegan.
Zum: Is it harder now to be vegetarian and travel now?
JR: Oh it’s much easier. Like going to Germany in 1970, it was sausage and sausage and sausage and sauerkraut drenched in whatever. It’s easier now. There are health food stores on every corner, all over the world. All over where I travel anyway. Even if there aren’t, if you have to travel you can take a few things with ya. Like, take a bag of oats. You can just add water to ‘em, you don’t have to cook ‘em. You get a bowl and oats. Take some sea salt…Add water, you got a meal. (laughs) A few raisins, you’re livin’ like a king. (laughs)
Zum: When did you first think of yourself as a vegetarian.
JR: Well, when I was 17 I knew this older guy. He must have been old like 26 or 24 (laughs)… And it was at this rock club I hung out at and he was the janitor and later became a friend for life. And he said things to me like, “Hey, did you ever think of being a vegetarian?” and I said, “No, can you do it? Can you live like that?” and he said “Yeah..” I said, “and you don’t, like starve to death?” and he said, “No.” And he was a big strong muscular guy himself and he said, ”I’m one” and I said, “That’s great.” And so I tried it. My mother had a fit. All of the sudden, “you mean you don’t want the corn beef sandwiches?” You know, like she would always make. And I tried it without it, and I made the mistake that new vegetarians make which is going to yogurt and sugar, like fruit-flavored yogurt with lots of honey in things. Cause you want something other than just the raw carrot. And if it’s not gonna be meat, a lot of times the temptation is to go to lots of dairy products and especially you end up getting sweetened stuff for some reason, I’m not quite sure what it is. And that was not doing it. My mother called that one right, she said, “You’re getting sick because you’re eating too much sugar,” and she was right. So that was when I first got interested. I was more or less a vegetarian from then on.

Buying Chickpeas in Spain

Zum: I know you like Spain a lot and you have songs in Spanish on your new album. However, I found that in France, when I was just vegetarian, that it was hard to get across what vegetarian really meant.
JR: Yeah, in fact sometimes in France I can think of instances where a friend of mine would take me to a certain place and the guy who ran it was a friend of his.
And my pal never brought me back there again ‘cause it was too embarrassing for him. They get too offended. They question your manhood…they have all kinds of problems with it. (laughs) It is a fixed system—it’s changing. But that generally is the way it’s always been. That’s restaurants, but you can go around this by going to a grocery store and get some oats and get a can of chickpeas…. There are loads of good things you can eat. In restaurants it’s much harder as you say ‘cause then there is a social question. “Is this person gonna be insulted?” A lot of times the chef will, but the grocery clerk isn’t gonna be offended when you just buy chickpeas.
There are now vegan restaurants in Spain. We went to one in Salamanca. There are vegan restaurants in Madrid. There’s also in Spain, articles in the daily papers against bullfighting.
Zum: Do you think that’s a movement really?
JR: Yes, and this is a big change for Spain, that you could even find such articles on the editorial pages of the daily papers; and long articles too.
Zum: Do you notice a good response to that from people you talked to?
JR: Actually I didn’t talk to anyone, I just read the papers. But I noticed, well the city of Barcelona has already passed a resolution to make Barcelona a non-bullfighting city. It’s major. It’s not legally binding but there is a group that had enough of a majority that they could make a resolution like that.

The President

Little Lord Fauntleroy

Business Opportunities

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Last updated December 14, 2004. [ edit this page ]

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