Richard X. Heyman is an American singer-songwriter, born in 1951 and raised in Plainfield, New Jersey, who has released seven albums ("Living Room!!", 1988; "Hey Man!", 1990; "Cornerstone", 1998; "Basic Glee", 2002; "Rightovers", 2003, "Actual Sighs", 2007, "Intakes", 2009 and the 2-CD set "Tiers/And Other Stories, 2011), two EP's ("Actual Size", 1986 and "Heyman, Hoosier & Herman", 2001), one single ("Vacation" b/w "Takin' My Chances", 1980), a memoirs entitled "Boom Harangue" and a video retrospective of his career, "X-Posures."
Heyman released his first indie EP, Actual Size, a collection of six of his finest songs recorded on an 8-track Tascam machine in a home studio, in 1987, the same studio in which Richard would subsequently record his album Living Room!!, released in 1988.[1]
Heyman started banging on things when he was five, got a full drum kit when he was seven, and was an accomplished drummer by the time he was twelve. He picked up guitar and piano in his teens, which was also when he began writing songs. Richard went solo in his twenties, although he’s also drummed for such artists as Brian Wilson, Link Wray, Jonathan Richman and the Left Banke’s Michael Brown, composer of "Walk Away Renee." He also played keyboards for the legendary Ben E. King and guitar for the lead singer of The Shangri-Las, Mary Weiss. His influences are as varied as Bernstein to The Beatles, Richard Rodgers to the Rascals, and the Blues to The Byrds. On the live front, Richard leads his own band on guitar and keyboards. Richard is also currently the drummer and contributing songwriter for legendary New Jersey garage rockers, The Doughboys (New Jersey). He and his wife, Nancy, live in Manhattan.
Richard X. Heyman is one of the sadly overlooked pop craftsmen of the '90s, but his albums are widely regarded in power pop circles as instant classics. Heyman began recording in the late '80s in the tradition of the studio nerd/one-man band, playing all instruments himself in his upper west side Manhattan apartment living room, named Brontasaurus, presumably after the classic song by the Move. He released the independent Actual Size EP in 1987 and followed with the full-length Living Room!! in 1988. Considerable word-of-mouth exposure led to the album being reissued by Cypress Records in 1990 in slightly modified form. He signed to Sire in 1990 and released one album for the label, the Andy Paley-produced Hey Man! in 1991. Poor sales led to him being dropped by the label, but he has continued recording (several albums' worth by his estimations) while shopping for the elusive new deal. Cornerstone was completed by 1996, but it wasn't released nationally until early 1998 by Permanent Press Records. In late 2000 Heyman issued Heyman, Hoosier & Herman, an EP featuring former Herman's Hermit Peter Noone on vocals for the title track and six outtakes from the Cornerstone sessions. Basic Glee arrived in 2002, followed by the Rightovers compilation a year later. Heyman reissued the Actual Size EP in 2007 with 14 previously unreleased tracks.