Jonathan Richman interview, 1984

“There's something I want to happen in the audience, and it's hard to put into words, feeling is as close as I can get."

First page of the article. Photo © Gary Lornie.

Happy birthday to Jonathan Richman (for this week).

I first saw Jonathan Richman at Hammersmith Odeon in the summer of 1977. It was one of the two shows recorded for the Modern Lovers Live LP. No-one knew what to expect: we’d only heard his single Roadrunner, already a proto-punk classic. The show was nothin…