I hear Richard Thompson is quite popular on this site. I have a few songs in my collection including one of his albums (You? Me? Us?) and know of Vincent Black Lightning. I even saw him live, in Bradford in the 90s. I have a few early Fairport albums, of course. But I don’t know much else.
A Richard and Linda song was posted on the Catharsis thread and it was a stunner (Dimming of the Day). And now it seems there’s a new collection out. Maybe it’s time to gem up. Any tips on other songs or albums of theirs to listen to?
Bradford Wool Exchange perchance?
I’ve just got the box set despite having the vinyl, the cds and the updates on cd.
I enjoy them all, (Sunnyvista is a bit of an acquired taste, not their best).
Don’t buy the new collection! According to SDE site there are issues playing (and ripping) the CDs.
Their first and last together (I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight and Shoot Out the Lights) are generally rated as their best, but my favourite is Pour Down Like Silver. First Light and Sunnyvista have their moments but are generally reckoned the low spots of their output.
There’s a decent selection on the single disc The End of the Rainbow: An Introduction to Richard & Linda Thompson, but that seems to be out of print at the moment and listed at £170 on Amazon. It’s good, but …
Add “Hokey Pokey” and “Guitar, vocal” to the above……..and yep Pour Down Like Silver is a real good un…….Oh and “Hand Of Kindness” is a little belter.
With you on those, especially ‘Hand Of Kindness’. My first RT album was ‘Daring Adventures’ and ‘Al Bowelly’s In Heaven’ remains one of my favourite songs ever.
Good luck on finding a copy of (guitar, vocal). However, with this latest collection, I think the only things not available elsewhere are the 2 short instrumentals (though I’m not 100% sure about the live rendition of Night Comes In).
I have a ridiculous amount of Fairport, Richard & Linda and Richard solo material and the size and variety of the catalogue is pretty daunting. I’d suggest that a very good place to start would be the 1993 3-CD compilation, Watching The Dark. That covers a good spread of studio and live work up to that date and should help anyone to work out which areas might be worth exploring further. There is plenty of good stuff from after 1993 but if you want something manageable to start with, it’s the best option I can think of. There seem to be a fair number of second-hand copies around.
I would second Watching the Dark which is the only place (I think) to find Galway to Graceland. Would also add Mock Tudor and Rumor and Sigh as essentials but if you are looking specifically at Richard and Linda then it has to be I want to see the bright lights. Very close to perfection.
G2G is also available on the Walking on a Wire 4 CD compilation
Galway to Graceland is on the first “Acoustic Classics” disc, too. Great record!
I was sticking to the R+L years above. For solo Richard my picks are, to choose a top 3 from a very rich catalogue, Amnesia, Mock Tudor and 13 Rivers.
I love his guitar live and there are (or were, I haven’t checked the shop on his site for a while) some excellent live authorised bootlegs. My pick of those being Semi Detached Mock Tudor, the one CD of his I’d save in a fire.
I’d agree with all those choices, especially Semi Detached Mock Tudor
In Concert live 1975 too.
I wouldn’t bother with the new box, that’s what. I’d get Guitar,vocal, tho probably unavailable. Likewise that An introduction to is good. Bright Lights and Shoot Out for R&L. His solo stuff I would consider the best of that came out a decade or so ago as quite good. I suspect I have all of em, and they are patchy to a one. Hand of Kindness probably my favourite.
I like Linda’s solo albums a lot
Fashionably Late (2002)
Versatile Heart (2007)
Won’t Be Long Now (2013)
plus her earlier compilation Dreams Fly Away and a salute to the Music Hall live theatre night recording with her family and famous friends My Mother Doesn’t Know I’m On The stage.
Her first solo album One Clear Moment from 1985 has some great songs and vocal performances on it, but it is rendered almost unlistenable (IMO) by a horrible generic 1980’s production job. Hugh Murphy was the guilty man.
Have you heard this, @Carolina? From a Simon Nicol album recorded in 1988? Might be on Dreams Fly Away, not sure if it’s the same recording….it’s lovely, anyway….
That’s beautiful. That’s a big help you posting it as I was looking for that track to put on my Spotify Playlist Project and couldn’t find it under Linda Thompson. Dreams Fly Away not on there, but have now found it under Simon Nicol. Many thanks!
Je vous en prie….
Richard acoustic, Richard electric, and Richard & Linda are 3 different listening experiences. I think Celtsmerchz is a very good example of the former, and also the lesser know Live at Crawley which is him and the blessed Danny Thompson on good form. If you can get it the double album 2-letter words is very good for both solo and band performances. I think a lot of his earlier solo catalogue doesn’t sound so great these days due to the production. Of his later stuff I’d favour Mock Tudor, The Old Kit Bag, Electric. Of the live albums Semi-Detached Mock Tudor is good, as is More Guitar. Like most people I reckon Richard & Linda’s debut, 4th and final albums are the best; that’s I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight, Shoot Out the Lights, and Pour Down Like Silver. And of the rest I’ve got a soft spot for his debut solo album Henry the Human Fly which he made when aged about 21, and also the wonderfully quirky 1000 Years of Pop Music which is a live performance. The latter is worth the price just for the stupendous version of Drinkin’ Wine Spo-de-o-dee which is just him and Michael Jerome on hand drum. Richard sounds like he’s playing bass, lead and rhythm guitars simultaneously, and yet you get the impression he’s concentrating solely on the singing and wondering where his next chance to take a breath will be.
Henry the Human fly really doesn’t sound like anybody else from that period, apart from maybe a nod to The Band. There’s some lovely stuff on it, eg The Poor Ditching Boy, Shaky Nancy, the very quirky Nobody’s Wedding and my fave, The Angels Took My Racehorse Away which I think is a splendid piece of songwriting
Another recommendation for Henry…..worth the entry fee for Nobody’s Wedding alone, but then I love a strathspey…..
BUY HARD LUCK STORIES!
Apologies for shouting but this new collection is rather marvellous.
People over on yon Steve Hoffman forums are winding themselves up into apoplexy, as they do, because they’re having problems ripping the discs. And the packaging? That’s not how they would spell Hawaiian.
I love the package – lovely book – and can’t be arsed ripping CDs when I can just listen on tidal etc.
The sound is fabulous. In particular, First Light and Sunnyvista are a revelation – much as I like my old vinyl, I’ll be sticking to these for a good while.
The ‘classic’ trio of bright Lights/Hokey Pokey/Pour Down Like Silver are rather good too. I have only a hazy idea of what ‘re-mastering’ entails but I like the results here.
And the extras! A lovely version of End of the Rainbow with Linda on lead (and a later live Night Comes In, ditto) is the highlight.
Run – run! – to your nearest music emporium (or laptop) and buy a copy. I can’t praise it highly enough.
Then get a hold of Hand of Kindness, Rumor and Sigh, and Mock Tudor and you’ll have pretty much the cream.
Watch this space…
I agree – it’s a fantastic box and even though I have probably 75 percent of it, buying it in this form was a no brainer. Hoffman’s site is giving itself a bad name.
At the moment the handful of reviews on Amazon are universally 1* due to the quality of the discs, which I can’t say fills me with confidence.
Do I really need this if I’ve already got the ‘Walking On a Wire 1968-2009’ boxset?
Thank you to all above who’ve posted from their knowledge and experience of RT and LT. It’s good to gradually explore another musical alcove that I was are of, but hadn’t looked into before. I’m sensing he’s a bit like an English Neil Young (marmite voice, distinct acoustic and electric styles).
I’m looking forward to gradually submerging myself. This is the first track that’s really grabbed me. Linda’s voice is a marvel – so steadfast and calm, yet ringing out so strong, and her expressive face is beautiful – unforced expression of the emotions in the words.
Haven’t seen this for years – how lovely!
Quality control is a shade better than old Neil’s…
Are they not stopping?
Have the other from the OGWT.
https://youtu.be/iaW693Aprjk
This is one I come back to. Linda in fine voice and RT’s feral Stratocaster very much in evidence.
Cheekbones – phew.
A pretty shallow reaction to someone with one of the finest voices on Earth, but me.
I’m talking about Linda BTW
No, I think that’s perfectly reasonable.
A genuinely beautiful woman … very thin on the ground in pop music in the 21st Century … and we kid ourselves if we think looks aren’t important in the entertainment business. See “Paul McCartney circa 1966.”
She swears like a trooper too which I like.
As does her daughter Kami.
I danced with Linda once outside the National Theatre when she appeared in the Mysteries.
I saw The Rails supporting RT at Cambridge Corn Exchange with our late brother Phil Pirrip and one Rail didn’t show up so Kami played on her own. After the second song, where people had sung along, she said “the next one is off my first solo album which you won’t be able to sing along to because nobody fucking bought it”. A song or two later she bemoaned playing on her own “but happily I have a spare guitarist backstage”. RT came on and they did “A heart needs a home”, Kami sounding a dead ringer for her Mum. Many wrinkly audience members found dust in the air. Including this one.
Oh dear, that’s not helping.
Hmmm, I have to say when I last saw them play they were duo, but one of them, definitely, felt he was the more significant. His light hearted “banter”, making light of any heritage his wife might have must make for chilly and silent drives home, which allied to all his rockstar shapes made me think him dick. A talented one, but still a dick. Don’t give ’em long…..
Yes. Linda’s version of I’m a Dreamer is magnificent.
I’m a glass half empty kinda guy and this is the finest L&R song.
Not the greatest clip but hey,
Every song on that tour has an additional resonance, when you are aware of the state of their relationship at the time….the BBC “Little Night Music” clip above is from the same period…
Here’s a clip from the Jake Thackray show – two songs, great version of Just the Motion….
I had no idea that Richard and Linda were guests on the Jake Thackray show.
I would’ve loved to have heard then have a go at covering “The Blacksmith and the Toffee Maker” or “Isabel Makes Love on National Monuments”….
I always associate Jake Thackray with That’s Life. “Growls, Sausages”
Why would that be? I don’t recall him having any association with that execrable programme.
On at least one series in the early 70s, Jake was the resident performer on That’s Life, i.e. he was on every week.
The Braden Beat before that. And Nationwide with Monsignor Cliff Michelmore.
“A bloo-dy fun-ny nun you ARE!”
This is from the infamous ‘divorce tour’. Richard had met another woman but Linda, who had only just had their third child, insisted on doing the shows. She had followed Richard into Islam, learned Arabic, lived in communes – but now she hit the bottle, hit him on some occasions, and rediscovered the voice which she had lost to dysphonia.
Simon Nicol, who played in their band on the tour, made the observation that it was as if Richard had spent their whole marriage writing songs for Linda to sing when he left her. Here’s Walking on a Wire.
That was torturous to listen to. It must have been horrible to be on that tour. Maybe it’s a mistake, but the shadow that casts makes me wonder if the relationship behind all their music was always so chilly.
I think the period in the religious commune was where the problems started. Linda didn’t appreciate being pushed into a subservient female role while RT discussed big topics with the men. Understandably so!
I have been listening to this collection on Spotify.
The thing that amazes me, and I don’t think anyone has noted it above, is that there is a performance of Hokey Pokey on Marc.
Incongruous doesn’t come into it.
I would have loved to have heard the discussions that went on around booking them onto the show.
As a performance though, apart from the caché of the venue, it’s fine but nothing special.
Not Marc Bolan!
Back into the top 10 with ye