The Motorcycle Portraits: Lyle Lovett

The Motorcycle Portraits is a project by photographer/filmmaker David Goldman, who travels the world making documentaries, and takes time out to interview interesting people in the motorcycle scene, wherever he might be.  The result is a single exemplary photo, a geolocation of his subject, and a transcribed interview.  The audio of his interviews can be found on The Motorcycle Portraits website.

The following is a portrait session with Lyle Lovett, a native of Texas best known for his music: he’s won four Grammys, had a Top 10 hit ‘Cowboy Man’, and recorded 14 albums to date.  He’s also an actor, including in four Robert Altman films, which is where he met his first wife Julia Roberts, on the set of ‘The Player’.  He’s a horseman, competing in reining competitions, and keeps quite a collection of motorcycles. In other words, he’s one of us. David Goldman caught up with Lyle in Los Angeles on June 23, 2021, and asked him a few questions about motorcycling.  The following are his responses:

Introduce yourself:

I’m Lyle Lovett and I’ve been riding motorcycles since I was 11 years old. My very first bike was a Honda. Mini trail the Z 50 a 1969 model yellow and white.

What was your first introduction or experience with bikes?

I got interested in motorcycles because my dad talked about riding his brother’s motorcycle when he’d come home from leave when he was in the Navy. And growing up in the Houston area as I did, we’d often go to Galveston. When I was a boy to for the weekend for fun we’d go to the beach. And there was a vendor on the beach in Galveston who rented Honda S 65’s and s 50s. And, and we would rent those, my dad and I. I would I’d get on behind my dad when I was you know, 6,7,8 years old, and we’d ride up and down the beach and it was just so much fun. I saw how much my dad enjoyed it. And I enjoyed sitting behind him being able to put my arms around him and feel that close to him. And, you know, to feel that beach air washing over your whole body. As you rode up and down the beach was you know, it was it was a feeling that I always wanted to repeat.

What is a great story or experience you’ve had that could only have come from bikes?

As much fun as riding is and as indescribable as riding is to someone, if you’re trying to describe what riding feels like to someone who doesn’t ride, as indescribable as it is, the best part about riding is the people you meet through riding, The bikes are wonderful. But the people, the people you meet, because of riding are the best part, the relationships that you make, because of riding can end up being lifelong relationships. And, in my case, growing up riding off road and going to motorcycle races with my parents, two or three weekends a month. I think of my racing days as some of the best quality family time that I ever had with my parents. And so, bikes represent people to me as much as they represent riding, and so for me it becomes all about the people involved in the activity, more than it is about the motorcycles themselves.

What do motorcycles mean or represent to you?

The motorcycle represents freedom above all else. It’s a freedom of movement freedom of exhilaration. It’s just the freedom of being able to have fun when you want to. Every time I step across a motorcycle and sit in the saddle and twist the throttle. My first thought is always why haven’t I done this more often. Every time I ride makes me want to ride again. It’s the motorcycle. The idea of the motorcycle, and the physical. The physical reality of a motorcycle is it represents freedom.