Tour Dates

16 Oct First Avenue Minneapolis, MN
17 Oct Englert Theatre Iowa City, IA
18 Oct Delmar Hall St. Louis, MO
19 Oct The Whirling Tiger Louisville, KY
21 Oct Manny’s State College, PA
23 Oct Lark Hall Albany, NY
24 Oct Somerville Theatre Somerville, MA
25 Oct Somerville Theatre Somerville, MA
26 Oct Somerville Theatre Somerville, MA
28 Oct SPACE Gallery Portland , ME
29 Oct SPACE Gallery Portland , ME
01 Nov Alderney Landing Theatre Dartmouth, NS

No photos. No phones. No notes. Just Jonathan Richman.

I knew the ushers’ instruction at the door was coming: tonight’s show would be phone-free. No baseball-score-checking, no setlist logging, no moment-by-moment documentation. You won’t need to capture Jonathan Richman in your snaps, your chats, or your reels, because he’ll make sure you remember tonight.

At 6 p.m., the doors opened to find Richman already darting around the stage, climbing stairs, sitting on a railing, making last minute preparations. By 6:30, fresh signs appeared: “No Photos.” Was the venue staff just now hearing about this? No matter. This night would be pure — a word that shows up often in writing about Richman, and one that fits.

It was, as advertised, “Live on Stage, Jonathan Richman with Tommy Larkins on Drums”. That’s it. No bass player. No backing tracks. Just two humans and a handful of mics, at the edge of the stage, bumped right up the crowd (no photos = no photo pit). And no sound board booth at the back of the room — a surreal bit of empty space on that green-and-white checkered floor.

The crowd skewed older, for sure, though one schoolkid with ear protection reminded us this was technically an all-ages show. Minneapolis sees this sort of thing for a “nostalgia” act, but Richman is more than that. He’s an artist who has never stopped, continually refining his plain-spoken perspectives on life.

Richman’s new album Only Frozen Sky Anyway is super-solid, and truly stands next to his finest work over the past 50+ years. It expands on his lifelong themes: eager explorations of life, with tenderness and humor. Richman’s songs seem simple, until you realize they aren’t; his delivery is mistaken for a childlike wonder, but there’s profound stuff in there.

Thursday night’s show saw him moving between English, French, Spanish, and Italian — “Let Her Go Into the Darkness” turned into a comical global phone chain of heartbreak. “Little Black Bat”, also from the new album, was not the only thing we heard in Spanish. “But We Might Try Weird Stuff” found him leading the crowd in a makeshift angelic choir.

And then there were the classics — “Pablo Picasso”, “I Was Dancing at the Lesbian Bar” — performed with the same mischievous energy that made them immortal, except this time with extra false endings. He’d strum to applause, step away from the mic, wait for the clapping to die, and nod to Tommy as he launched right back into another verse. Ridiculous. Effective. The crowd approved. “Older Girl” got the same treatment – and it paired nicely with “Girl Friend”, which is a span of two songs, he noted, that take him from the ages of 14 to 17. (Those are tough ages, talking to girls.)

The inclusion of “He Gave Us the Wine to Taste It,” underlined the phone-free experience. The wine is for drinking, not for writing an essay. The show is for experiencing, not for relaying later. (I’m doing my best.)

As we walked out, someone recalled a story of seeing him outside this very venue in the late 80’s, when Richman grabbed a guitar from the van and played a couple songs for an underage fan who couldn’t get in. It’s easy to imagine him doing it again. Spontaneous, sincere, still the same Jonathan Richman.