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 -- R. ChristgauThe first Modern Lovers album was cobbled together by Beserkley supremo Matthew King Kaufman from demos, the bulk of which had been produced by John Cale in 1972 when it looked as if the band would be signed to Warner Bros. Despite the fragmentary nature of its parts, The Modern Lovers is surprisingly coherent and contains all of Richman's classic creations: "Roadrunner," "Pablo Picasso," "Girl Friend," "She Cracked," etc. The stark, simple performances highlight an adenoidal New England voice that lacks everything technical but nothing emotional. One of the truly great art-rock albums of all time. -- Trouser Press
Some history is necessary. Four or five years ago, David Johansen's New York Dolls and Jonathan Richman's Boston-based Modern Lovers were the most talented progenitors of what is now known as New Wave or punk rock. Rightly or wrongly, the Dolls were quickly written off as a last gasp of the Sixties rather than a first glimpse of the Seventies, and Richman was considered to weird for any record company to support (Warner Bros. tired for a while). Now, with punk in full bloom (in the media, at least), Johansen is revving up for a comeback on Blue Sky, and Beserkeley has released three Richman albums in 18 months.
Actually, Richman's early work--his best, by far--wasn't as weird as it was uncompromising and innocent. Technically, he had one of the worst voices in rock & roll, but his songs were as straight and true as an arrow stuck in a lovesick teenager's heart. He had two great themes: the pain and wonder of adolescent romance (boy-girl, not man-woman) and the need to embrace and synthesize the moral values of both the Old and the Modern World (his terms). At his best, he was as pure and daring as Charlie Chaplin's Little Tramp, and his first band (there have been many versions of the Modern Lovers) played with an incredible sense of mood.
But being one of the godfathers of a movement apparently isn't easy. after his four songs on Berserkley Chartbusters, richman has gone from single-minded honesty (The Modern Lovers) to simple-minded childishness... -- Paul Nelson, RS
Back on the East Coast, an 18 year-old kid named Jonathan Richman was excited after hearing the Velvet Underground’s 1970 farewell album, Loaded. He use to perform unaccompanied in a park in Boston until he formed the Modern Lovers because, said Richman in an immortal quote, “I was lonely.” He also wanted to follow up his own revelation of V.U.’s lyrical terrain and manic drone, with the help of future Talking Heads keyboardist Jerry Harrison and future Cars drummer David Robinson.
Again, former Velvet Underground maestro John Cale guided another young legend by producing the first and last Modern Lovers album in 1971. Richman abandoned the aggressive worship of sex, drugs and other decadent vices in favor of a fresh romanticism of the modern world. “Roadrunner” celebrated neon road signs, convenience stores and power lines in the spirit of The Velvet Underground’s “Rock and Roll.” “Someone I Care About” replaced sexism and macho egotism with sensitivity and respect. “I’m Straight” and “She Cracked” were uniquely eloquent expressions of angst. “Pablo Picasso,” “Girlfriend” and “Government Center” displayed the playful humor that Richman would later become identified with. -- Fastnbulbous
If things had turned out just a little differently, there is every chance that we would all be saying it was The Modern Lovers that were the truly first punk rock band instead of The New York Dolls. But, it was just in the cards that this Boston band’s debut record was put off by a few years. In truth, we were lucky this classic album was released at all. The Modern Lovers were an American rock band led by Jonathan Richman in the 1970s and 1980s. The original band existed from 1970 to 1974 but their first recordings were not released until 1976. It featured Richman and bassist Ernie Brooks with drummer David Robinson (later of The Cars) and keyboardist Jerry Harrison (later of Talking Heads). The sound of the band owed a great deal to the influence of The Velvet Underground, and is now sometimes classed as “proto-punk”. It pointed the way towards much of the punk rock, new wave, alternative and indie rock music of later decades. Their only album, the eponymous The Modern Lovers, contained stylistically unprecedented songs about dating awkwardness, growing up in Massachusetts, and love of life and the USA.
Richman grew up in Natick, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston, and began playing guitar and writing songs in his mid teens, first performing solo in public in 1967. He became enamored of the Velvet Underground while he was still in high school, and after graduating in 1969, he moved to New York City where he became personally acquainted with the band and on one occasion opened the bill for them. Richman spent a couple of weeks sleeping on Velvets’ manager Steve Sesnick’s sofa before moving into the Hotel Albert, a residence known for its poor conditions.
After nine months in New York, and a trip to Europe and Israel, Richman moved back to his native Boston. With his childhood friend and neighbor, guitarist John Felice, he organized a band modeled after the Velvets. They quickly recruited drummer David Robinson and bass player Rolfe Anderson, and christened themselves “The Modern Lovers”. They played their first date, supporting Andy Paley’s band The Sidewinders, in September 1970, barely a month after Richman’s return. By this time their setlist already included such classic Richman songs as “Roadrunner”, “She Cracked” and “Hospital”. Richman’s unique character was immediately apparent; he wore short hair and often performed wearing a jacket and tie, and frequently improvised new lyrics and monologues.
In early 1971 Anderson and Felice departed; they were replaced by Harvard students bassist Ernie Brooks, and keyboardist Jerry Harrison, completing the classic lineup of the Modern Lovers. This new configuration became very popular in the Boston area, and by the fall of 1971, enthusiastic word-of-mouth led to the Modern Lovers’ first exposure to a major label when Stuart Love of Warner Bros. Records contacted them and organized the band’s first multi-track session at Intermedia Studio in Boston. The demo produced from this session, and the group’s live performances, generated more attention from the industry, including rave reviews from critic Lillian Roxon, and soon A&M Records was interested in the band as well.
In April 1972, the Modern Lovers traveled to Los Angeles where they held two demo sessions: the first was produced by the Velvet Underground’s John Cale for Warner Bros. while the second was produced by Alan Mason for A&M. The Cale sessions were later used on the band’s debut album. While in California the band also performed live, and one gig at the Long Branch Saloon in Berkeley was later issued as a live album. Producer Kim Fowley courted the band, traveling to Boston to produce some poor-quality demos in June 1972. Felice rejoined the group for a few months after his graduation, and the band moved together to live at Cohasset, Massachusetts. The Modern Lovers continued to be a popular live attraction, and on New Year’s Eve 1972 supported the New York Dolls at the Mercer Arts Center on a bill which also included Suicide and Wayne County. Early in 1973 they were finally signed by Warner Brothers. However, before returning to the studio in Los Angeles to work with Cale, the group accepted an offer to play a residency at the Inverurie Hotel in Bermuda. While there, Richman heard and became strongly influenced by the laid-back style of the local musicians, as documented in his later song “Monologue About Bermuda”. There were also growing personality clashes between the band members.
Although on the band’s return Richman agreed to record his earlier songs, he was anxious to move in a different musical direction. He wanted to scrap all of the tracks they had recorded and start over with a mellower, more lyrical sound. The rest of the band, while not opposed to such a shift later, insisted that they record as they sounded now. However, the sessions with Cale in September 1973 also coincided with the death of their friend Gram Parsons (a former Harvard student, like Harrison and Brooks), and produced no usable recordings. The record company then recruited Kim Fowley to produce more sessions with the band, this time at Gold Star Studios, with better results. Recordings from these sessions with Fowley were later released in 1981 on an album misleadingly titled The Original Modern Lovers.
Following the failure to complete a debut album, Warner Brothers withdrew their support for the Modern Lovers, and Robinson left the band. They continued to perform live for a few months with new drummer Bob Turner, but Richman was increasingly unwilling to perform his old (although still unreleased) songs such as “Roadrunner”, and after a final disagreement between him and Harrison over musical style the band split up in February 1974. In late 1974, Richman signed as a solo artist with Matthew “King” Kaufman’s new label, “Home of the Hits”, soon to be renamed Beserkley Records, and recorded four tracks with backing by the bands Earth Quake and The Rubinoos, including new versions of both “Roadrunner” and “Government Center”. These tracks were first issued as singles and then on an album Beserkley Chartbusters Vol.1 in 1975. In 1976, with a new version of the Modern Lovers, Richman began recording what he would regard as his debut album,Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers.
However, in the meantime, Kaufman also put together the album The Modern Lovers from remixed versions of the tracks recorded four or more years previously for Warner Brothers and A&M, and released it in August 1976. “Hospital” was credited as being ‘donated by Jerry Harrison’ because he had the original 1971 session tapes. The Modern Lovers was immediately given an enthusiastic critical reception, with critic Ira Robbins hailing it as “one of the truly great art rock albums of all time”. It influenced numerous aspiring punk rock musicians on both sides of the Atlantic, including the Sex Pistols, whose early cover of “Roadrunner” was placed on The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle. In the UK, the versions of “Roadrunner” produced by Cale and Kaufman were released as two sides of a single, and became a chart hit in 1977. -- Chris Bell, Earbuddy
Bostonian Jonathan Richman had been an avid Velvet Underground fan. Hence the stripped-down sound of his first band, The Modern Lovers, whose original recording lineup featured drummer David Robinson (The Cars), keyboard player Jerry Harrison (Talking Heads), and bassist Ernie Brooks. Live appearances around Boston elicited interest from Warner Bros., who booked the band into a California studio in 1973, for sessions produced first by John Cale then Kim Fowley.
His early work voiced a beautifully contradictory world view: he embraced the "Modern World" but would not dismiss the "Old World"; was attracted to self-destructive girls ("She Cracked," "Hospital") but sang of a new romanticism in the awesome "Girlfiend" and "Someone To Care About," songs that turned their back on the Sixties sexual revolution.
Most of all he had a penchant for modern hymns -- to the macho lifestyle of painter Pablo Picasso in a song covered by Cale himself and later Bowie, and to the eternally appealing call of the road on the two-chord classic "Roadrunner," covered by a legion of garage bands since, perhaps most famously in the Sex Pistols.
Warner then dropped the band. Three years later, Beserkley released the album, scoring a hit single with "Roadrunner." But Jonathan had split the band by the time the demos were finished, and had a new career in mind: he would downsize his sound to acoustic rock 'n' roll and sing, in his nasal tone, about insects, Martians, and rocking leprechauns.-- Ignacio Julià, 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die