Robert Christgau: Dean of American Rock Critics

Consumer Guide:
  User's Guide
  Grades 1990-
  Grades 1969-89
  And It Don't Stop
Books:
  Book Reports
  Is It Still Good to Ya?
  Going Into the City
  Consumer Guide: 90s
  Grown Up All Wrong
  Consumer Guide: 80s
  Consumer Guide: 70s
  Any Old Way You Choose It
  Don't Stop 'til You Get Enough
Xgau Sez
Writings:
  And It Don't Stop
  CG Columns
  Rock&Roll& [new]
  Rock&Roll& [old]
  Music Essays
  Music Reviews
  Book Reviews
  NAJP Blog
  Playboy
  Blender
  Rolling Stone
  Billboard
  Video Reviews
  Pazz & Jop
  Recyclables
  Newsprint
  Lists
  Miscellany
Bibliography
NPR
Web Site:
  Home
  Site Map
  Contact
  What's New?
    RSS
Carola Dibbell:
  Carola's Website
  Archive
CG Search:
Google Search:
Twitter:

The Modern Lovers [extended]

  • Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers [Beserkley, 1976] B+
  • The Modern Lovers [Home of the Hits, 1976] A
  • Rock & Roll With the Modern Lovers [Beserkley, 1977] B+
  • Back in Your Life [Beserkley, 1978] B+
  • Jonathan Sings! [Sire, 1983] A
  • Rockin' and Romance [Twin/Tone, 1985] B-
  • It's Time for . . . [Upside, 1986] B-
  • Having a Party With Jonathan Richman [Rounder, 1991] *
  • Precise Modern Lovers Order [Rounder, 1994] ***
  • Action Packed: The Best of Jonathan Richman [Rounder, 2002] ***
  • Not So Much to Be Loved as to Love [Sanctuary/Vapor, 2004] Dud
  • Revolution Summer: Original Soundtrack to the Film [Vapor, 2007] Dud
  • No Me Quiejo De Mi Estrella [Vapor/Munster, 2014] ***

See Also:

Consumer Guide Reviews:

Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers: Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers [Beserkley, 1976]
Well then, is this Lou Reed without chemicals or Loudon Wainwright III with a cold? If the former, he'd better renegotiate his right to be fey by balancing off each new LP with some rock 'n' roll drone ("Road Runner," say, or the Earth Quake cuts on Beserkley Chartbusters). And if the latter, there'd better be one funny song as astonishing as "Pablo Picasso" (or "Rufus Is a Tit Man") every time. B+

The Modern Lovers [Home of the Hits, 1976]
These legendary sessions, produced by John Cale for Warners in the early '70s but never released, still sound ahead of their time. Jonathan Richman's gift is to make explicit that love for "the modern world" that is the truth of so much of the best rock and roll: by cutting through the vaguely protesty ambience of so-called rock culture he opens the way for a worldliness that is specific, realistic, and genuinely critical. Not that he tries to achieve this himself--he's much too childlike. Sometimes his unmusicianship adds a catch to a three-chord melody and his off-key singing unlocks doors you didn't know were there. But other times he sounds like his allowance is too big, as worldly as Holden Caulfield with no '50s for excuse--the first rock hero who could use a spanking. A

Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers: Rock & Roll With the Modern Lovers [Beserkley, 1977]
This all-acoustic record is even further in general tough-mindedness from Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers than that fey testament was from The Modern Lovers; it defines the difference between a child who is cute and a child who knows adults think children are cute. Sometimes I think I should hate it. But in fact I don't, because its self-indulgence represents not the manipulative arrogance of a star but rather the craziness of an almost powerless case of arrested development, and you can hear that. However unattractive a child Richman may be, he does convey the fragile lyricism only children are capable of. B+

Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers: Back in Your Life [Beserkley, 1978]
I'd say this is great kiddie music--lotsa innocence, lotsa animal songs, even a snot joke. But kiddies seem to prefer Donna Summer. So put him down as an original and wonder yet again just how much that counts for. B+

Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers: Jonathan Sings! [Sire, 1983]
Like a bit of great modern rock and roll only more so, Richman's surprising return to his senses plays havoc with all notions of artistic maturity. It couldn't have happened if he hadn't finally grown up, but it wouldn't have been half as striking if he'd relinquished his kiddie lyricism in the bargain. "Not Yet Three," "The Neighbors," and the admonitory campfire anthem "That Summer Feeling" have the magical complexity of masterworks without the reassuringly forbidding aura of mastery, generating just enough authority to shore up lesser songs that might have seemed merely eccentric on their own. Granted, without the disarmingly precise backup of Ellie Marshall and Beth Harrington, Jonathan's singing might have seemed merely eccentric as well. It doesn't. A

Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers: Rockin' and Romance [Twin/Tone, 1985]
It's a thin line between ooh and ick, and when he starts saying bum for ass (butt, buns, behind, backside, rear end, tush, I'll even settle for bottom) you can figure the feybirds have flitted off with another album. I like Walter Johnson myself, but Jonathan should realize that maybe Vincent van Gogh deserved to be called an asshole. B-

Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers: It's Time for . . . [Upside, 1986]
I think eternal youth is the secret of rock and roll myself. But if anybody really and truly believes that feeling "Just About Seventeen" is the way to achieve it, the arch nostalgia of this moderately gifted neoprimitive egomaniac should send them running for the Geritol. B-

Jonathan Richman: Having a Party With Jonathan Richman [Rounder, 1991]
confessions of a reluctant grownup ("Monologue About Bermuda," "The Girl Stands Up to Me Now") *

Precise Modern Lovers Order [Rounder, 1994]
live Harvard '71 and Berkeley '73, back when Jonathan thought cute was pretending he couldn't spell "girlfriend" ("A Plea for Tenderness," "The Mixer [Men and Women Together]," "I'm Straight") ***

Jonathan Richman: Action Packed: The Best of Jonathan Richman [Rounder, 2002]
miniaturist under the magnifying glass ("Monologue About Bermuda," "Closer," "You're Crazy for Taking the Bus") ***

Jonathan Richman: Not So Much to Be Loved as to Love [Sanctuary/Vapor, 2004] Dud

Jonathan Richman: Revolution Summer: Original Soundtrack to the Film [Vapor, 2007] Dud

Jonathan Richman: No Me Quiejo De Mi Estrella [Vapor/Munster, 2014]
Digs Leonard Cohen, digs his wife more, is so big in Spain he's learning the language, and--one more thing--will never own a cell ("Here It Is," "You Can Have a Cell Phone That's OK but Not Me") ***

See Also