Take a quick glance at the track list, and you’ll see that four of the nine songs have the word “little” in their titles. And those aren’t the only Jonathan Richman songs to have that word in their titles. I don’t know what it all means – maybe nothing – but if I do meet him again, I hope I remember to ask. Anyway, this album opens with one of them, “I’m A Little Airplane.” In this one, Jonathan sings, “I’ll fly in the dark/Over the baseball park.” The park in question is Fenway. Jonathan Richman And The Modern Lovers also released a song titled “The Fenway” on an album in 1985 (will that one get a special re-issue soon?), and the Fever Pitch soundtrack contains his “As We Walk To Fenway Park In Boston Town.” Anyway, this is a fun song to get things going. There is some stage banter at the end of the track, in which Jonathan Richman has to convince the audience that he’s wearing a clean shirt, “a brand new shirt.” Apparently he was wearing a similar shirt at the concert the previous night. And he leads the band into the second of the four “Little” songs, “Hey There Little Insect,” in which he gets the audience laughing at several points. I love how positive his music is, no matter the topic. I mean, hell, this is the guy that some credit with creating punk music, and you’ll have a difficult time finding a song in which he expresses anger. “Hey There Little Insect” is followed by “Egyptian Reggae,” a very cool instrumental number that was included on Rock ‘N’ Roll With The Modern Lovers, released the same year as this live album.
The moment the group begins “Ice Cream Man,” the audience gets excited. And those few that didn’t recognize it straight away then cheer when Jonathan Richman begins to sing it. This song is so goddamn adorable. But then again, you could say that about nearly everything he has recorded, and about the man himself. I met him once in the 1990s. I was a DJ at KWVA in Eugene, Oregon, and he came to the station to do some promotion for a concert he was doing that night. I had a CD I wanted him to sign. He took the liner notes and the pen from my hand and, without removing the pen cap, signed his name. Of course, the signature was not visible, so I removed the cap and handed the pen and liner notes back to him, and without acknowledging the error, he signed his name again. This time it was visible. Anyway, this version of “Ice Cream Man” is hilarious. It seems to reach its natural conclusion at the three-minute mark, and the audience claps. But then the song continues, and the audience is even more into it. Again, it seems to end, and the audience cheers more loudly. But no, it’s not over yet. And now the audience begins to clap along. “You like the ice cream man?” Jonathan Richman asks, and then leads the group into the song once more. At one point, he even starts to introduce another song, but then jumps back into “Ice Cream Man.” And guess what? That’s not the end either. They then do a slower version. And never once do they lose the audience. In fact, when they stop, someone in the crowd shouts out a request for “Ice Cream Man,” taking the joke to an even higher level. Good for him! And so a three-minute song goes on for nearly eight minutes.
Then we get another of the “Little” songs, “I’m A Little Dinosaur.” This one gets the audience laughing as well. That’s the thing about Jonathan Richman: he can get an audience into a sort of giddy ecstasy. That’s how it was when I saw him in concert. There was so much joy in the room, so much laughter. No stoical faces to be found. It was like we all lost control, and never wanted to regain it. That’s followed by the final of the “Little” songs on this album, “My Little Kookenhaken.” “Now you don’t know what that word means,” he sings, and the audience laughs. And later he admits, “I don’t know what it means either.” It’s a sweet number. The first two “Little” songs were followed by an instrumental track, and these two are likewise followed by an instrumental tune, this time “South American Folk Song,” the album’s only cover. It’s another cool tune, and one to transport us to another place. There is some banter between Jonathan and someone in the audience after the song.
“New England” is one of my personal favorite Jonathan Richman songs. Yes, that is in part because I am from Massachusetts. Several of his songs are about New England, of course, including what is probably still his most famous song, “Roadrunner.” But this one is about missing home, which I can appreciate. Plus, it is just so sweet and catchy. This live album concludes with “The Morning Of Our Lives,” another totally sweet and wonderful song. This song opens with these lines: “It hurts me, dear/To see you’ve got no faith in yourself.” And talking about a positive song, in this one he sings, “You don’t got nothing to be afraid of/You’re not as bad as you think/And you’re always putting yourself down/But I’m just going to tell you that I like you.” How about that? This song encourages us to enjoy the current moment and to have faith in ourselves.
CD Track List
- I’m A Little Airplane
- Hey There Little Insect
- Egyptian Reggae
- Ice Cream Man
- I’m A Little Dinosaur
- My Little Kookenhaken
- South American Folk Song
- New England
- The Morning Of Our Lives
This re-issue of Live is scheduled to be released on October 21, 2022 through Omnivore Recordings.
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