Kinky Friedman, Texan humorist, country singer, writer and ‘equal-opportunities offender’ – obituary

Friedman as an Independent gubernatorial candidate, with a car sponsored by his campaign in 2006 - Billy Smith II/Houston Chronicle via Getty Images

Kinky Friedman, who has died aged 79, was a wise-cracking Jewish country singer, satirist, self-proclaimed “equal-opportunities offender”, reformed cocaine addict, novelist, and by his own account “the oldest living Jew in Texas who doesn’t own any real estate”.

As the flamboyant, Stetson-wearing, cigar-chomping frontman of the Texas Jewboys country-and-western band, “the Kinkster”, as he called himself, toured America in the 1970s as part of Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder revue and set out to offend more or less everyone.

He upset every Christian, feminist and anti-racism campaigner foolish enough to take him seriously with ballads such as They Ain’t Makin’ Jews Like Jesus Anymore (“They just don’t turn the other cheek the way they done before”), and Get Your Biscuits in the Oven and Your Buns in the Bed, in which he called on women “to occupy the kitchen, liberate the sink”.

That particular ditty provoked what he described as “a group of cranked-up lesbians” to attack his band onstage at a 1973 concert and in 1974 the National Organisation of Women declared Friedman male chauvinist pig of the year.

Friedman’s fellow Texans, meanwhile, failed to see the joke in (“proud to be an”) Asshole From El Paso (“A place where sweet young virgins are deflowered / You walk down the street in knee-deep tacos”). When Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys played Buffalo it took a police escort to get them past the lynch mob.

From the mid-1980s Friedman turned novelist, writing a series of best-selling comic detective stories starring a wise-cracking Jewish country singer and reformed cocaine addict – called Kinky Friedman.

Friedman hosting Willie Nelson's 4th of July Picnic in Austin, Texas, 2015 - Photo by Rick Kern/WireImage

In 2006 he stood for governor of Texas under the slogans “Why the hell not?” and “How hard could it be?”. His manifesto included support for gay marriage (“Why shouldn’t homosexuals be as miserable as everybody else?”); abolishing the death penalty (“What part of ‘Thou shalt not kill’ don’t you understand?”); cutting the speed limit from 55 to 54.95 mph; legalising casino gambling (“Slots for tots”); and banning the de-clawing of cats.

He finished fourth out of six, with 12 per cent of the vote. But at least he enjoyed the publicity: “I won that election, everywhere but Texas.”

In 2000 Friedman proudly told the Daily Telegraph’s Peterborough column that he had made it into the history books as the man who provided the very cigar that almost toppled Bill Clinton’s presidency.

“Clinton was my pen pal for about three and a half years,” he recalled. “He invited me to a big dinner at the White House. I gave him a Cuban cigar… I told him: ‘Remember, Mr President, we’re not supporting their economy, we’re burning their fields.’ He laughed and took the cigar, but didn’t smoke it – and that was before the Monica Lewinsky story broke.”

Friedman turned his hand to crime fiction during a lull in his musical career and the result was Greenwich Killing Time (1986), which introduced Kinky Friedman the sleuth

The eldest of three children, he was born Richard Samet Friedman in Chicago on November 1 1944 to Thomas Friedman, a psychologist, and Minnie, née Samet, a speech therapist, both children of Russian Jewish immigrants. A college friend nicknamed him Kinky because of his curly hair.

Shortly after his birth the family had moved to Texas, where in 1953 his parents founded and ran Echo Hill Ranch, near Kerrville, a “non-competitive, child-centered” camp for boys and girls aged between six and 14. His father also taught at the University of Texas.

From Austin High School, Friedman studied psychology at the University of Texas at Austin, where he protested against segregated lunch counters and founded his first band, King Arthur & the Carrots, parodying Beach Boys songs about surfing, cars and girls.

After graduation he joined the Peace Corps, which sent him to Borneo. “I was inspired by JFK,” he recalled. “I wanted to do good. But I was basically teaching farming to people who had been quite successfully doing it for 2,000 years… My major accomplishment was showing the natives how to play frisbee. Of course, some of them stole the frisbees and used them to make their lips big, which set my programme back.”

Friedman in 1974, not long after founding his band, Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys - Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

While there he played the guitar, wrote country songs and returned home to form Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys in 1971. The band went on to record more than a dozen albums, beginning in 1973 with Sold American, which featured such tracks as High on Jesus and Ride ’Em Jewboy, an “extended tribute” to the victims of the Holocaust.

Unfortunately, despite his attracting fans such as Bob Dylan, Ringo Starr, and Willie Nelson (with whom he played chess), the populace at large remained unimpressed. Friedman’s chances of success were not improved by his growing addiction to cocaine, and the band broke up in 1979.

Moving to New York, he played small solo gigs around Greenwich Village. Then in 1986, in an ultimately successful effort to kick his drug habit, he returned to his family’s Echo Hill Ranch in Texas where, in lieu of rent, he did laundry for the camp.

His musical career going nowhere, Friedman turned his hand to fiction, and the result was Greenwich Killing Time (1986), which introduced Kinky Friedman the sleuth. Working out of a trailer on the camp property, with only a cat and a pet armadillo for company, he wrote some 20 detective novels and a number of other books.

“Right now,” he informed the Telegraph in 2000, “I’m writing a non-fiction thing called Kinky Friedman’s Guide to Texas Etiquette. It’s pretty short, about the same length as Black Yachtsmen I Have Known.”

He continued to release solo albums and sometimes went on the road with a re-formed Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys. He made several tours of Europe, mixing up readings, jokes and standards such as They Ain’t Makin’ Jews Like Jesus Anymore. He particularly enjoyed touring Germany, joking that “the Germans are my second-favourite people… Of course, my first is everybody else.”

Back in Texas he founded an animal-rescue centre and helped to save more than 1,000 ageing and abandoned dogs. In 2010 and 2014 he ran for state agricultural commissioner, without success.

Friedman never married, explaining: “I’m not against marriage. I’m against my marriage.”

Kinky Friedman, born November 1 1944, died June 26 2024

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