Kinky Friedman, 79, died; musician and humorist killed sacred cows

Kinky Friedman, a singer, songwriter, humorist and sometime politician who developed a passionate following among alt-country fans with his band, the Texas Jewboys, with songs such as “They Ain’t Makin’ Jews Like Jesus Anymore” — and whose biting cultural commentary earned him comparisons to Will Rogers and Mark Twain — died Thursday at his ranch near Austin, Texas. He was 79.

Writer Larry Sloman, a close friend of mine, said the cause was complications of Parkinson’s disease.

Mr. Friedman occupied a unique place on the fringes of American popular culture, alongside artists such as Jello Biafra, the Dead Milkmen and Mojo Nixon. He looked back at the mainstream with songs that mixed vaudeville, outlaw country and hocus-pocus, a bawdy style of novelty music epitomized by such tunes as “Asshole From El Paso” and “We Reserve the Right to Refuse Service to You.”

Sporting a thick mustache, sideburns, a Honduran cigar and a wide-brimmed cowboy hat, he played his own version of Texas-influenced country music while provocatively poking fun at Jewish culture, American politics and a wide range of sacred cows, including feminism—the National Organization for Women once awarded him the Male Chauvinist Pig Award.

Behind his jokes lay a serious musical talent. He sang in a clear, deep voice, modulated with a gentle twang, and played guitar in a simple, straightforward style that he had adopted from one of his idols, Ernest Tubb.

He toured extensively with his band and solo in the 1970s, including the second part of Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue in 1976. He performed on “Saturday Night Live” and the Grand Ole Opry – Mr. Friedman claimed he was the first Jewish musician to do so (although others, including the violinist Gene Lowinger, had preceded him).

Another performance, recorded for the television show “Austin City Limits,” was said to be so blasphemous that it was never broadcast.

In the 1980s, after the band broke up, Friedman turned to writing crime novels, using the same casual irreverence he expressed onstage in books such as Kill Two Birds and Get Stoned (2001) and God Bless John Wayne (1995).

In the 2000s, he also wrote a column for Texas Monthly magazine, where he let his freak flag run free with articles about politics, music, and life in rural Texas.

But behind his madness lay a surprising seriousness. Mr. Friedman founded a ranch for rescued animals. He and his sister Marcie ran Echo Hill Camp, which they inherited from their parents, and offered it free of charge to the children of parents killed while serving in the U.S. military.

“The kinkster was a personality,” said Mr. Sloman. “Richard was one of the most sensitive and warm-hearted people in the world.”

And although his independent run for governor of Texas in 2006 was viewed by many as a joke, he insisted he was serious – and why not, given the recent successes of Jesse Ventura and Arnold Schwarzenegger?

He ran on a platform that called for the legalization of drugs, the lifting of the smoking ban and a reduction in the speed limit from 55 to 54.95 miles per hour. But he also called for higher teacher salaries and tougher action against illegal immigration. He came in fourth place with 12 percent of the vote; Republican incumbent Rick Perry was re-elected.

Still, it could be difficult to distinguish when Friedman was joking and when he was serious—which, he believed, was the whole point. A song like “Ride ’em Jewboy,” with its hilarious, offensive title, was actually a sad parable about the Holocaust.

“They Don’t Make Jews Like Jesus Anymore” was about anti-Semitism, and “The Ballad of Charles Whitman,” supposedly about the gunman who killed 16 people in Austin in 1966, was a scathing denunciation of Texans’ love of all things grand and outrageous (“The chancellor cried, ‘This is childish/And of course it is most unpleasant/But I must admit it is a lovely farewell.’”)

But he wasn’t above just poking fun, and other songs were less nuanced. “Get Your Biscuits in the Oven and Your Buns in the Bed,” a lampoon of feminism released in 1973, at the height of the women’s movement, drew fierce criticism from women’s groups; Mr. Friedman said that at a concert in Buffalo that year, a group of “excited lesbians” stormed the stage.

Disarmingly, he was often his own biggest target.

“With a name like Kinky,” he told the New York Times in 1995, “you should be famous, otherwise it’s a social embarrassment.”

Richard Samet Friedman was born on November 1, 1944, in Chicago to psychologist Thomas Friedman and speech therapist Minnie (Samet) Friedman. Shortly after his birth, the family moved to the Texas Hill Country, west of Austin, where his parents founded and managed the Echo Hill Ranch. His father also taught at the University of Texas.

As a child, Richard worked at camp, played competitive chess, and slowly settled into his role as a cowboy, despite being a proud Jewish person; at age nine, he refused to participate in his school’s Christmas play.

He began playing music in high school with his friend and fellow believer Jeff Shelby, who later went by the name Little Jewford. Western swing, an unusual mix of country, polka and jazz, was at its peak and he took inspiration from eccentric talents of the genre such as Milton Brown and Bob Wills.

“I was the illegitimate child of two cultures, and they seemed to have a lot in common, cowboys and Jews,” Friedman told the Aspen Times in 2006. “They both wear their hats indoors.”

He never married. He leaves behind a brother, Roger, and a sister, Marcie Friedman.

Mr. Friedman studied psychology at the University of Texas, where a friend who saw his perpetually curly hair gave him the nickname Kinky. After graduating in 1966, he spent two years with the Peace Corps in Borneo before returning to Texas and beginning his musical career.

His first band, King Arthur and the Carrots, played songs that parodied surf rock; their only single, “Schwinn 24,” about a boy and his bicycle, played Beach Boys songs about cars and girls. He joined Little Jewford and other musicians – all with fancy stage names like Wichita Culpepper and Sky Cap Adams – to form Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys in 1973.

The band was part of a growing tide of country-rock bands, alongside acts such as Gram Parsons, the Eagles and the Band. After releasing two well-received albums, Sold American (1973) and Kinky Friedman (1974), they were in demand as opening acts for megastars such as Mr. Dylan and Willie Nelson.

Friedman was gregarious and warm-hearted, and made friends quickly, including with fellow chess player Nelson and radio host Don Imus, who regularly featured him on his show. But he also felt that he enjoyed life a little too much: “There is a fine line between fiction and nonfiction,” he wrote in 2004, “and I think Jimmy Buffett and I crossed it in 1976.”

After the Texas Jewboys split up in 1979, he moved to New York, where he played small solo gigs in clubs and cafes around his home in Greenwich Village.

In 1984, he was walking down the street looking for cigars when he saw a man attacking a woman. He separated the two and waited for the police.

He later learned that the woman was Cathy Smith, who had been charged in 1983 with injecting comedian John Belushi with a fatal dose of heroin and cocaine.

“With 12 million people in the city, it had to be her,” he told Texas Monthly in 1993.

Friedman returned to Texas in 1986, partly to get sober. He lived at Echo Hill Ranch and did laundry for the camp instead of paying rent. He ran for justice of the peace in nearby Kerrville, but lost after a newspaper revealed that he had allowed 1960s radical Abbie Hoffman to stay at the camp.

The incident with Mrs Smith inspired him to pursue a second career as a writer. Living in a dark green trailer on the camp grounds with only a cat and an armadillo for company, he wrote 18 books, including novels and essays.

Most of his novels, starting with 1986’s Greenwich Killing Time, offer an even crazier version of his own life, revolving around a Texas private detective named Kinky Friedman who solves strange crimes in New York.

Other titles had equally ridiculous names, including “Elvis, Jesus and Coca-Cola” and “The Love Song of J. Edgar Hoover.” His books sold quickly in both the United States and Europe, eventually selling more than six million copies.

Mr. Friedman announced his candidacy for governor in 2004 in front of the Alamo in downtown San Antonio. Early slogans – “My governor is a Jewish cowboy,” “How hard can it be?” – seemed to suggest shady intentions.

But with the support of other Texas music stars like Mr. Nelson and Lyle Lovett, his campaign soon gained momentum.

“We’ve reached a point where Texans are taking this more seriously than I am,” he told the Aspen Times. “I didn’t think it would happen this quickly.”

His lack of preparation was particularly evident during a debate against Perry and other candidates. But his fundamental outsider character convinced thousands of voters.

“The hopes of Texans rest on this campaign – cowboys, teachers, students. Everyone,” he said. “I think the soul of Texas rests on this campaign.”

After the race, Friedman returned to his column in Texas Monthly, which he continued until 2010. He entered politics twice more, running unsuccessfully for the state’s Secretary of Agriculture in 2010 and 2014.

He also returned to music, playing solo or with his old buddies from the Texas Jewboys. His latest album, “The Poet of Motel 6,” is out this year.

And he spent more and more time on his ranch. Echo Hill Camp closed in 2013, but three years ago he and his sister reopened it, this time with a focus on helping the children of fallen soldiers and the children of refugee families from Afghanistan.

“There was a volunteer who was fixing a water heater, and I went over to thank him,” he told Texas Highways magazine in 2023. “He said, ‘You’re welcome. I’m doing it for Jesus.’ I told him, ‘I’m doing it for Moses.'”