Quiet man of rock has a lot to shout about

The Liquid Room

IF you walk out of a Jonathan Richman show and your ears are ringing, best call a doctor. Even if you are standing right next to the speaker stack, you are likely to hear just as much if the power cuts out and Richman continues on regardless.

Sporting nothing louder than a dashing red shirt and a nylon-stringed guitar, backed only by minimalist drummer Tommy Larkins, Jonathan Richman is always going to elicit more decibels from the crowd than the PA system.

At the grand old age of 51 - but looking not long past his mid-30s - the former Modern Lover is the quiet man of rock.

But such is his uniqueness, such is his hold on his slightly nutty audience of fanatics, that only a handful of interlopers - quickly glared at by their neighbours - are so heedless as to speak over the music.

Richman’s songwriting range hasn’t changed radically over the years - even the numbers he sings in Spanish or his country and flamenco turns are deeply rooted in basic 50s doo-wop and unabashed melodicism, while affairs of the heart are almost always foremost in his mind.

Give Paris One More Chance is a simple ode that implies there’s something wrong with you if you don’t feel romantic in the French capital. Similarly, only the coldest of hearts could fail to warm to Richman’s charm.

Springtime In New York is as straightforward a paean to a city as was ever written, but his observations are amazingly vivid and his guitar playing is wonderfully lucid.

For all the talk of his oddball nature and quirky cult appeal, few people take time to mention just what a fine instrumentalist he is, or for that matter what a great showman.

For a man whose lyrics deal so often with fond reminiscences and nostalgia, he applies little sentimentality to his own older songs, freely re-working Here Come The Martian Martians and Egyptian Reggae in an almost improvisational fashion.

He also has a gift when it comes to languages, applied with great comic effect in Let Her Go Into The Darkness, when a couple’s tragic failure to understand one another is rendered in French, Italian, Spanish and even Hebrew.

At one point a shouted request for Vampire Girl is made from the audience and is immediately acceded to - a rarity indeed at a Richman show.

It is a song which laughs at the dark image favoured by Goths, but it is the gentlest, most tender mockery imaginable, even ending with a dig at himself when it turns out the girl in question owns all Richman’s albums.

And with a cheeky version of Arrivederci Roma, he leaves on the stroke of 10pm.

No encore is forthcoming but such showbusiness touches have never been his forte. Entertaining, however, is a skill he will never lose.