S/D: Richard Thompson

Good piece:

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2010/apr/11/richard-thompson-faith-feature

In what might look a little like poetic justice, Thompson has recently been the subject of some of the songs of his musician children, Teddy and Kamila. He is not always shown in a favourable light...

"There is a song of Teddy's about me being a rotten father, just like there are songs by Martha and Rufus Wainwright about Loudon Wainwright being a horrible dad. And the question you have to ask is: Is it a good, honest song? If it is, then fine. I've talked to Linda about this. At some point, the specific circumstances of its writing become diffuse and it stands on its own. That is what songs are – little capsules of emotion. Divorce was hard and horrible and gruesome on the kids."

Since its not on Spotify, I tried to rip my copy of Live, Love, Larf & Loaf this am but ran into technical problems. Will report back but I always liked the RT stuff on there.

It's there, Spotify just eefed up the artist name:
http://open.spotify.com/album/1HSH6ewB5U5sSwqyMphGZS

Oh nice! Looks as though Invisible Means is not, however. Have my heard that one.

One other thing I forgot to mention:

I've actually always been a bit underwhelmed by "1952 Vincent Black Lightning." Perhaps it's because before I even heard it it was being touted as "the best thing he'd ever written"/a classic/etc. When I did eventually hear it (when I bought Rumor & Sigh in 1991) it seemed ... like a folk song. A good one for sure, but nothing that left me floored or changed how I viewed the guy. By comparison, "Beeswing" seems so much better – equally timeless, but less trope-y and more vivid.

When I heard the recorded version I was a bit disappointed in it, but I first heard it live and I think I was in tears by the end of it.

it's a great little cinematic narrative

and yeah it works better live. i hate when people say things like that, but it's true.

although sometimes if his voice goes to low on "riiiiiiide" it can sound a little corny

Have to say, Hokey Pokey is a helluva record. Feel like it gets lost next to IWTSTBLT, but the tunes are very solid, the arrangements are great (awesome accordion on things like "The Egypt Room"), and RT's vocals are a little less boomy than they become on later records. And "A Heart Needs a Home" is one of the best things the man ever did.

Acoustic Classics has a solo live-in-the-studio impact; for me, the strongest album versions of "1952 Vincent Black Lightning" and "Valerie," especially. On headphones, seems like might possibly be a few dubs, but he's often gotten much the same sound while sitting on a YouTube picnic table.

there are a few tracks on hokey pokey that are a little too twee for my tastes (speaking as a guy who likes the field mice!). but yeah on the whole it's a great one. i somehow managed to snag that on vinyl way back in the 1990s for a few bucks, and i've held onto it since.

this version of A Heart Needs a Home from BBC absolutely destroys me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqViJyweNV0

this is so dope

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7JlxB4KQnU

prob Pour Down Like Silver is my fav these days? a devotional album where "no graven images" is taken very seriously, so these are abstract love songs. his vocals with Linda coil together on "For Shame of Doing Wrong" like a geometric design. the lyric of "Beat the Retreat" is almost a chant, like a blues but with some kind of flute snaking throughout. "Night Comes In": obv a guitar showcase but the lyric is something else too, redemption at hand by means of another, a real companion (what did Linda think her role was in this? not the beloved it seems!). & of course "Dimming of the Day".

this version of A Heart Needs a Home from BBC absolutely destroys me



Re. "A Heart Needs a Home," the studio version has an incredible arrangement with the piano and harp blending so effortlessly. But this is amazing.

i need to listen to pour down like silver again

but yeah agreed on hokey pokey and p much any version of heart needs a home

http://eil.com/images/main/Richard-Thompson-Richard-Thompson-261078.jpg
this is such a good comp, just such a wide range of stuff, all of it amazing. kind of interesting, too -- is it the first "rarities" compilation?

growing a beard was def a good move on his part

XP Great Lost Kinks Album and/or Kink Chronicles.

I have this weird 2-record set that has IWTSTBLT and most of Guitar, Vocal (maybe missing the Fairport tracks). Anyway there's one side that's just the extended live versions of "Calvary Cross" and "Night Comes In" and that's where I want to live.

ah yeah, i think my college radio station had that double LP.
good call on the kinks -- forgot about those.

odds n sods?

There's also that Stones Metamorphosis record, but the Kinks one was probably the first.

Is the live Calvary on guitar, vocal the same one that's on the Best Of The Island Years cd?

I think so, there's a different version on the Bright Lights reissue.

Also I cosign "One Door Opens" as a great song, The Old Kit Bag was the last album that I really wanted to return to on the regular, honestly I'm a bit burnt out on his storytelling style.

Big fan of More Guitar for live RT flash.

One of the last times I saw him even the ushers at the venue were slack-jawed during his solo in Can't Win.

Old Kit Bag has Word Unspoken, Sight Unseen, utterly gorgeous.

Ooh I've been missing out on this thread. I love Richard Thompson. Very few people can match him as a live performer.

My favorite song of his that is not The Calvary Cross is Time To Ring Some Changes. I just found a killer version on youtube, starts around :52

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXDdpduNJU8

Went to the record store today and up on the rack was a super clean original UK press of Vocals, Guitar! $25, couldn't resist

Er Guitar, Vocal

odds n sods?

― i did it all for the 'nuki (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, November 14, 2014 4:46 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Nope, that was 1974.

guy i have a great idea - neil young and richard thompson trading solos over "calvary cross" chord change for 12 hours

apparently, chris forsyth/solar motel band played calvary cross over the weekend in chicago -- that is probably as close as we'll get!

The "Sloth" on the Fairport Troubadour album is Crazy Horse @ The Fillmore-esque to my ears.

I'd love to hear a 20 min Neil style jam of "Tam Lin"

I could see this working as a Grayfolded sort of collage.

Forsyth doesn't play Chicago until tomorrow, but if they play calvary cross I might just freak out.

wait they are already in chicago?! i thought they were playing tomorrow?

and i will be there to get water for you if you freak out aj!

oops sorry, that was in indiana, i was confused. yeah you guys should yell for it!

Has its own site: reviews, interviews etc.
http://www.thompsonfamilyalbum.com/

stumbled into 'A Heart Needs a Home' in a mix today and it floored me

Thompson family live at City Winery NYC: http://nodepression.com/live-review/we-are-family-thompsons-live

RT answers your questions, spring session pt. 1:

http://www.richardthompson-music.com/news/2015/3/30/rts-spring-q-a-part-1?utm_source=FAN+MAILING+LIST&utm_campaign=48b5eeae84-RT_Newsletter_March_VIP&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_0938a8e7d7-48b5eeae84-163448545

Renowned guitarist and songwriter Richard Thompson is set to release Still, an album of new music, produced by Jeff Tweedy on June 23 via Concord Records in the US and June 29 via Proper Records internationally. Still will be available in several configurations including a twelve-track CD, a twelve-track double 180-gram vinyl album and a deluxe CD package that includes the five song Variations EP, from a previously unreleased session

TRACK LISTING
1. She Never Could Resist A Winding Road
2. Beatnik Walking
3. Patty Don’t You Put Me Down
4. Broken Doll
5. All Buttoned Up
6. Josephine
7. Long John Silver
8. Pony In The Stable
9. Where’s Your Heart
10. No Peace No End
11. Dungeons For Eyes
12. Guitar Heroes
Still was recorded in a two-story rehearsal loft in Chicago over the course of just nine days with Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy at the helm, backed by several longtime players from both Thompson’s and Tweedy’s bands. Insert Jeff Tweedy quote. Thompson enlisted Tweedy’s production skills in an effort to shake up his own creative approach to making records. “It turned out be really good idea,” says Thompson. “Jeff is musically very sympathetic. Although some of his contributions are probably rather subtle to the listener’s ear, they were really interesting and his suggestions were always very pertinent.”

Taken as a whole, Still is a powerful dispatch from an acknowledged master who remains unafraid to put himself into demanding new environments – its title reflecting that resilience and seemingly endless resourcefulness. “Or,” Thompson adds slyly, “it could be read as ‘Is he still performing? I thought he died years ago.”

Insert Jeff Tweedy quote

i prefer his older press releases to these new, poorly proofread ones

Every press release I write from now on is going to have the sentence "Insert Jeff Tweedy quote." IMO there's almost nothing that wouldn't be improved by "Insert Jeff Tweedy quote," including actual Jeff Tweedy quotes. Jeff Tweedy could give press conferences where he just leaned toward the mic and said, "Insert Jeff Tweedy quote here." It'd be like the scene in Being John Malkovich where everything comes out "Malkovich Malkovich Malkovich."

But as for Mr. Thompson. Many years ago I heard an exceptionally pure and simple live version of "Happy Days and Old Lang Syne" on Prairie Home Companion (of all places), probably 2001 or 2002. It was perfect. The album version (which I think is on Old Kit Bag) is over-embellished and syncopated awkwardly. I really wish I could find an early live version.

Other S&D:

"Turning of the Tide" kicks major arse - both solos are tasty but I think the second one is a little better. Now I have to go listen to it.

I like "When I get to the Border" a lot but the coda is needless TradWank.

Currently I feel that I've heard "52 Vincent..." and "Beeswing" as much I need to for now. Still top-notch songs, but they've been a little overplayed in my household. Right now I'm preferring Mary Lou Lord's versions, which may be heresy but so be it.

Oh and "Wall of Death" and "I want to see..." are grebt; I can personally do without another hearing of "Feel So Good" or "Crawl Back" but I understand their appeal.

Tangentially Teddy's version of "Tonight Will Be Fine" from that Cohen tribute is also gorgeous.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8W89j6GjPDI