Kinky Friedman, musical satirist and Texas candidate, dies

Kinky Friedman, musical satirist and writer who also ran for Texas governor, dies at 79

Kinky Friedman wearing a black cowboy hat, black jacket, white open-collar shirt and a serious expression

June 28, 2024 4:50 PM PT

Kinky Friedman, author, singer-songwriter and former Texas gubernatorial candidate, died Thursday after a years-long battle with Parkinson’s disease. Friedman was 79.

“He died peacefully,” close friend Kent Perkins, who knew Friedman for about 50 years, told the Associated Press in confirming the death. He said Friedman died at his family’s ranch near San Antonio.

“He smoked a cigar, went to bed and never woke up,” Perkins said.

Perkins described Friedman as the “last free person on earth” and said he had an “irreverence about him. He was a fearless writer.”

Friedman — born Richard Samet Friedman in Chicago on Nov. 1, 1944 — stirred buzz with his provocative and unapologetic nature, which became widely known when his band, Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys, found success in the 1970s.

The satirical country band released songs such as “Drop Kick Me, Jesus, Through the Goal Posts of Life,” “Get Your Biscuits in the Oven and Your Buns in the Bed” and “They Ain’t Makin’ Jews Like Jesus Anymore.”

But the band’s brash nature was apparently not well received by some.

“In 1973, the Texas Jewboys received death threats in Nacogdoches, got bomb threats in New York, and required a police escort to escape radical feminists at the University of Buffalo,” the musician wrote in a personal essay for the September 2001 issue of Texas Monthly.

Friedman — who was nicknamed Kinky, or the Kinkster, because of his curly hair — then traveled with Bob Dylan in 1976 as part of the Rolling Thunder Revue tour. By the 1980s, after his band’s success had cooled, Friedman turned to a new venture: writing.

He penned several New York-based crime novels, including “Greenwich Killing Time” and “Roadkill,” that featured himself as a detective. At the time of his death, Friedman had written more than 20 books.

Joking that he needed “a job right now,” Friedman elevated his profile when he challenged incumbent Republican Gov. Rick Perry in the 2006 Texas governor’s race, according to the Houston Chronicle.

The race became prickly. Friedman, one of five candidates, was hit with allegations of racism over remarks he made in 1980. He denied the accusations, stating that his style of humor was intended to draw reactions.

Offending people “was the purpose,” Friedman told the Houston Chronicle in 2006. “That’s what I was doing. That’s called social commentary, that’s called satire.”

He ran on a campaign that supported gay marriage (“I think they have every right to be as miserable as the rest of us”) and prayer in school (“What’s wrong with a kid believing in something?”) but ultimately finished in last place. Perry won reelection.

Reflecting on the race four years later, Friedman told The Times that more musicians should get into politics.

“If the musicians ran the country, we wouldn’t get a hell of a lot done in the morning, but we’d work late and we’d be honest,” he said. “When I’m in a roomful of musicians, those are decent people, good people. You can’t say the same about politicians.”

And he was still proud of his gubernatorial campaign.

“We won that race, by the way,” Friedman said, “every place but Texas.”