Richard Thompson Biography

Richard John Thompson OBE (born 3 April 1949) is a British songwriter, guitarist and recording and performing musician.

Thompson was awarded the Orville H. Gibson Award for best acoustic guitar player in 1991. Similarly, his songwriting has earned him an Ivor Novello Award and, in 2006, a lifetime achievement award from BBC Radio. Artists who have recorded Thompson's compositions include such diverse talents as Del McCoury, R.E.M., Bonnie Raitt, Christy Moore, David Gilmour, Mary Black, Elvis Costello, Marshall Crenshaw, The Corrs, Sandy Denny, June Tabor, Joel Fafard, Maria McKee, Shawn Colvin, Norma Waterson, Martin Carthy, Nanci Griffith, Graham Parker, Jefferson Starship, The Pointer Sisters, Maura O'Connell, Los Lobos, John Doe, Greg Brown, Bob Mould, Barbara Manning, Loudon Wainwright III, The Futureheads, Jeff Lang, Dinosaur Jr., David Byrne, and The Blind Boys of Alabama.

Thompson made his dbut as a recording artist as a member of Fairport Convention in September 1967. He continues to write and record new material regularly and frequently performs live throughout the world.

Thompson was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2011 New Year Honours for services to music. On 5 July 2011, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Aberdeen.

Early life and career (1949 to 1972)

Richard John Thompson was born in Ladbroke Crescent, Notting Hill, West London, England. His father, a Scot, was by profession a Scotland Yard detective, and an amateur guitar player; several other family members had played music professionally. While still attending William Ellis School in Highgate, he formed his first band "Emil and the Detectives" (named after a book and a movie by the same name) with classmate Hugh Cornwell, later lead singer and guitarist of The Stranglers, on bass guitar.

Like so many musicians of his generation, Thompson was exposed to and embraced rock and roll music at an early age, and he was also exposed to his father's jazz and traditional Scottish music record collection. His father had seen Django Reinhardt play in Glasgow in the 1930s and played guitar himself. He was later described by his son as "a bad amateur player himself, with three chords, though, unfortunately, not C, F and G." All these styles were to colour Thompson's playing in the years to come.

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By the age of 18 Thompson was playing with the newly formed Fairport Convention. Thompson's guitar playing caught the ear of American producer Joe Boyd. Largely on the strength of Thompson's playing Boyd took them under his wing and signed them to his Witchseason production and management company.

Boyd said:

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Shortly thereafter Thompson, already acquiring a reputation as an outstanding guitar player, started writing songs seriously. This seems to have been out of necessity as Fairport Convention was essentially a cover band at first.

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By early 1969, when Fairport's second album What We Did on Our Holidays was recorded and released, Thompson was starting to emerge as a songwriter of distinction. As Fairport's line-up and their sound evolved, Thompson continued to grow in stature as a player and as a songwriter with compositions like "Meet on the Ledge". He also wrote songs jointly with the band's fiddle player, Dave Swarbrick, songs such as "Crazy Man Michael" from the seminal folk-rock album Liege and Lief and "Sloth" from its follow-up Full House.

On 12 May 1969, between the recording and release of Unhalfbricking, Fairport's van crashed on the M1 motorway on the way home from a gig at Mothers, a club in Birmingham. Drummer Martin Lamble, aged 19, and Thompson's girlfriend Jeannie Franklyn were killed. The rest of the band suffered injuries of varying severity.

In January 1971 Thompson announced that he was leaving Fairport Convention. His decision seems to have been instinctive, rather than a calculated career move.

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In April 1972 he released his first solo album Henry the Human Fly, recording with Sandy Denny, Pat Donaldson, Sue Draheim, John Kirkpatrick, Barry Dransfield, Ashley Hutchings, Linda Peters, Andy Roberts, and others. The album sold poorly and was panned by the press, especially the influential Melody Maker magazine. With time Henry has come to be more highly regarded, but at the time the critics' response hurt both Thompson and his career.

1970s: Richard and Linda Thompson

By this time Thompson had begun a relationship with the singer Linda Peters, who had sung on Henry the Human Fly. In October 1972 the couple were married, and Thompson, with Linda now effectively his front woman, regrouped for his next album and the next phase of his career.

The first Richard and Linda Thompson album, I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight, was recorded in May 1973 in short time and on a small budget. Largely because of the petrol shortage in Britain and its impact on the availability of vinyl for records, Bright Lights was held back by Island Records for nearly a year before being released in April 1974. The album was well received by the critics, though sales were less than stellar.

Thompson's lyrics expressed a rather dismal world view, and it has been suggested that the bleak subject matter of his songs helped to keep his recordings off the hit parade. A more likely explanation was given by ex-Island A&R man Richard Williams in the 2003 BBC TV documentary Solitary Life: Thompson was just not interested in fame and its trappings.

The Thompsons recorded two more albums"?Hokey Pokey and Pour Down Like Silver, both released in 1975"?before Richard Thompson decided to leave the music business. The couple moved to a Sufi community in East Anglia.

It was not apparent from their records at first, but the Thompsons had embraced an esoteric Sufi strand of Islam in early 1974. I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight was recorded before this conversion, but released some time afterwards. The songs for the second Richard and Linda album, Hokey Pokey, were similarly written some time ahead of the album's recording and eventual release. It was Pour Down Like Silver, with its cover photo of a turbaned Richard Thompson gazing out at the world, that tipped the public off to the Thompsons' growing preoccupation with their faith.

The trilogy of albums released either side of his sojourn in the commune was heavily influenced by Thompson's beliefs and by Sufi scripture, but in the long run his religious beliefs have not influenced his work in an obvious manner. The outlook expressed in his songs, his musical style, the subjects addressed by his lyrics have not shown any fundamental change. He remains a committed Muslim.

Thompson started to re-engage with the world of professional music in 1977. He guested on an album by Sandy Denny, and had undertaken a short tour and started recording with a group of musicians who were also Sufis. Thompson asked Joe Boyd to produce these sessions, and two days were spent on the initial recordings. Boyd recalls that the sessions were not a success: "It was really, I felt, very poor. I didn't have much confidence in the musicians that he was working with. The atmosphere was very strange and it just didn't seem to work."

At about this time the Thompsons and their family moved out of the commune and back to their old home in Hampstead. Boyd had already invited Richard Thompson to play on Julie Covington's debut album. With spare studio time and the American session musicians hired to work on the Covington album available, the Thompsons went back into the studio to record under their own name for the first time in three years.

The resulting album, First Light, was warmly received by the critics but did not sell particularly well. Neither did its follow up, 1979's harder-edged and more cynical Sunnyvista. Chrysalis Records did not take up their option to renew the contract, and the Thompsons found themselves without a contract, but not without admirers.

1980s

Gerry Rafferty had booked the Thompsons as the support act for his 1980 tour, and had also used Richard as a session player on his Night Owl album. Rafferty offered to finance the recording of a new Richard and Linda Thompson album which he would then use to secure a contract for the Thompsons. Richard Thompson fell out with Rafferty during this project and was not happy with the finished product. Nevertheless, Rafferty kept his side of the bargain and presented the album to several record companies - none of which expressed interest in signing the Thompsons. Rafferty did not recover his investment.

About a year later Joe Boyd signed the Thompsons to his small Hannibal label and a new album was recorded. Shoot Out the Lights included new recordings of many of the songs recorded in 1980. Linda Thompson was pregnant at the time of the recording, so the album's release was delayed until they could tour behind the album. Breathing problems arising from her pregnancy also meant that Linda could not sing the lead part on some of these songs as she had done on demo tapes and the Rafferty-produced recordings.

As an interim measure, Richard Thompson decided to arrange for a low-key tour of the U.S. This tour was set up by Nancy Covey who had been in the UK in 1981 trying to sign Thompson to play at the famous McCabe's guitar shop in Santa Monica. During this tour Thompson and Covey grew closer to each other, and in December 1981 Richard and Linda Thompson separated.

Upon its release in 1982, Shoot Out the Lights was lauded by critics and sold quite well - especially in the U.S.

The Thompsons, now a couple for professional purposes only, toured the U.S. to support the album and then went their separate ways. Both the album and their live shows were well received by the American media, and Shoot Out the Lights effectively relaunched their career - just as their marriage was falling apart. The performances were very strong,but the tension between Richard and Linda was all too obvious.

After a stormy tour of the U.S., the Thompsons separated professionally. Richard Thompson continued recording as a solo artist. His 1983 album Hand of Kindness saw him working with Boyd again, but with a revised backing band and a more extroverted and up-tempo song selection.

With his separation from Linda finalised, Richard Thompson began to commute between twin bases in London and Los Angeles and began to tour regularly in the USA. Encouraged by the success of his solo shows in late 1981 and early 1982, he began to perform solo with increasing frequency and continued to tour with a band. In 1983 and 1984 he toured the USA and Europe with the Richard Thompson Big Band, which included two saxophone players in addition to the more usual rhythm section, second guitar and accordion. Set lists included covers of classic rock 'n roll songs and jazz standards such as "Tuxedo Junction".

In 1985 Thompson returned to the big league when he signed with PolyGram and received a sizeable advance. He also married Nancy Covey and moved his home and his working base to California. As part of the settlement that allowed Thompson to leave Boyd's Hannibal label for Polygram the live album Small Town Romance was released. This comprised recordings made during Thompson's solo shows in the USA in late 1981 and early 1982.

1985's Across a Crowded Room was his last album to be recorded in England and the last to have Boyd as producer. Thompson put together a new look backing band for the tour to promote this album, and some shows were filmed for a live video release (see Richard Thompson discography).

In 1986 he released Daring Adventures, which was recorded in Los Angeles and produced by Mitchell Froom. Daring Adventures, with a rich sound, markedly different production and use of American session players, was perceived by some as evidence of Thompson's increasing "Americanisation". Perhaps more significantly, the album continued the trend, begun with Across A Crowded Room, of Thompson's songs moving away from the seemingly personal material and towards the character sketches and narratives for which he has since become famous. Froom and PolyGram had plans to target college and the growing "alternative" markets with Daring Adventures. Sales improved, but not substantially. Polygram declined an option to renew the contract. Thompson's management negotiated a new deal with Capitol Records.

In 1985 Fairport Convention reformed and recorded the album Gladys' Leap. Thompson did not rejoin Fairport, but he did contribute a song to the project and played guitar on another track on the album.

1988 saw the release of Thompson's first album for Capitol, Amnesia. Froom was retained as producer, and once again the album was recorded in Los Angeles with many of the same players that Froom had called upon for the Daring Adventures sessions.

1990s

Thompson contributed music to BBC Northwest's documentary Hard Cash and appears on the eponymous accompanying album issued by Topic. A track from the album, Time To Ring Some Changes is included in the 2009 Topic Records 70-year anniversary boxed set Three Score and Ten as track thirteen on the sixth CD.

Thompson appears on Willie Nile's 1991 Places I Have Never Been album.

In 1991 Thompson recorded Rumor and Sigh, his second album for Capitol. Once again Froom produced.

For a short while a late career commercial breakthrough seemed likely. Rumor and Sigh was nominated for a Grammy and sold well. However, a shake-up at Capitol saw Hale Milgrim (Thompson's champion and fan within the boardroom) replaced by Garry Gersh. Thus, Thompson's next album Mirror Blue was held back for almost a year before being released, and the momentum that could have capitalised on the critical success and popularity enjoyed by Rumor and Sigh never followed.

In 1992 he performed with David Byrne. Their joint acoustic concert at St. Ann & The Holy Trinity in Brooklyn Heights, New York on 24 March, produced the album An Acoustic Evening, which was released the same year.

Mirror Blue was released in 1994, to often negative reviews sparked by the production decisions that Thompson and Froom took. Thompson took to the road to promote the album. He was joined by drummer Dave Mattacks, Danny Thompson (no relation) on double bass, and Pete Zorn on acoustic guitar, backing vocals, mandolin and various wind instruments. This line-up toured with Thompson the following two years.

Thompson continued recording for Capitol until 1999, when Mock Tudor was recorded and released. His deal with Capitol was modified so that he could release and directly market live, limited-quantity, not-for-retail albums. The first of these was Live at Crawley, released in 1995.

2000s

In 2001 Thompson declined the option to renew his contract and parted ways with Capitol.

In 2003 the BBC produced a documentary about Thompson's long musical career, entitled Solitary Life, directed by Paul Bernays and narrated by John Peel. It featured interviews with Thompson from his home in California and contributions from Billy Connolly, Bonnie Raitt, ex-wife Linda Thompson, Harry Shearer and Thompson's wife Nancy Covey. The programme was re-broadcast by BBC Four in September 2012.

The move away from big labels and big budgets paradoxically brought a bigger marketing push and healthier sales. Thompson's first two self-funded releases, 2003's The Old Kit Bag and 2005's Front Parlour Ballads, did well in the indie charts on both sides of the Atlantic. In May 2007 Thompson released Sweet Warrior. The album was licensed to different labels in different territories: Shout! Factory in the USA, P-Vine in Japan, Planet Records in Australia, and Proper Records in the UK and Europe. In August of the same year Island released a live Richard and Linda Thompson album, compiled from recordings made during the November 1975 tour to promote the Pour Down Like Silver album.

Thompson continued releasing "official bootlegs" on his boutique label as an additional source of revenue - all live recordings.

2010s

In early 2010 Thompson assembled a band and did a string of shows showcasing new material. The aim was to record the new material in a live setting. The recording and touring band consisted of Thompson, Pete Zorn, (acoustic guitar, flute, saxophone, mandolin, vocals); Michael Jerome (drums, vocals), Taras Prodaniuk, (bass guitar, vocals); and Joel Zifkin, (electric violin, mandolin, vocals). The resulting album Dream Attic, released in August the same year, was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album.

On 10 June 2010 Thompson was awarded the Mojo Les Paul Award for "Guitar Legend".

Thompson curated the 2010 Meltdown Festival. The festival included a tribute to the recently deceased Kate McGarrigle, a feature of which was a rare on-stage reunion of Richard and Linda Thompson.

Thompson was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2011 New Year Honours for services to music. On 5 July 2011, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Aberdeen.

In early 2013 Thompson released Electric, recorded in Nashville with Buddy Miller producing. The record enjoyed good reviews and debuted in the UK top 20. Thompson took to the road with a stripped down "power trio" band on a multi-month tour on both sides of the Atlantic to promote the new album.

Also in 2013, Thompson appeared on his ex-wife Linda's fourth studio album Won't Be Long Now, on the track "Love's for Babies and Fools" . It is the second time the two have recorded together since Shoot Out the Lights, the other being the song "Dear Mary" on Linda's 2002 album Fashionably Late.

In 2014, Thompson released Acoustic Classics, an album featuring acoustic renditions of 14 songs from his back catalogue, on his Beeswing label. The record reached number 16 on the UK Albums Chart.

Thompson appears alongside family members, both blood related and by marriage, on the album Family (2014) by Thompson (the band being named for all the Thompsons that appear), performing two songs solo and contributing to others as well. The album was produced by son Teddy Thompson and features ex-wife Linda Thompson, The Rails who are Thompson's daughter Kami Thompson and her husband James Walbourne, as well as other related musicians, including Walbourne's brother and Richard Thompson's son from his second marriage.

Thompson released Still in June 2015, an album produced by Jeff Tweedy of Wilco and recorded in Tweedy's The Loft Studio. In September 2015 he appeared on BBC Two's Later... with Jools Holland, where he performed "All Buttoned Up" and ""She Never Could Resist a Winding Road" from his album Still.

Side projects and collaborations

In between leaving Fairport Convention in early 1971 and releasing his debut solo album in 1972 he undertook a large amount of session work, most notably on albums by John Martyn, Al Stewart, Matthews Southern Comfort, Sandy Denny and Nick Drake.

During the same period he also worked on two collaborative projects. Morris On was recorded with Ashley Hutchings, John Kirkpatrick, Dave Mattacks and Barry Dransfield, and was a collection of English traditional tunes arranged for electric instruments. The Bunch were almost the reverse conceptually - a grouping of English folk rock musicians (including Sandy Denny, Linda Peters and members of Fairport Convention) recording a selection of classic rock and roll tunes.

Thompson has continued to guest on albums by an array of artists, from Crowded House, Bonnie Raitt and Vivian Stanshall, to Norma Waterson and BeauSoleil and folk artists like Loudon Wainwright III, Cathal McConnell (of The Boys of the Lough) and Bob Davenport. He has also performed and recorded with Teddy Thompson, his son from his marriage to Linda Thompson.

Since the early 1980s Thompson has appeared at Fairport Convention's annual Cropredy Festival, both in his own right and as a participant in sets with current and previous Fairport members. These sets are seldom confined to performances of songs out of the Thompson or Fairport Convention canons, and in recent years some surprise offerings have included the soul classic "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" (with Thompson backed by the Roy Wood Big Band), The Beatles' "I'm Down" and even "The Lady Is a Tramp".

Thompson has displayed a penchant for the avant garde as well, working with former Pere Ubu singer David Thomas's grouping The Pedestrians on two albums in 1981 and 1982, respectively. In the 1980s, he was associated with a loose-fitting group called The Golden Palominos, who were led by drummer Anton Fier and included at times on stage and on record Jack Bruce, Michael Stipe, Carla Bley, John Lydon, Bill Laswell and others. He has worked with experimental guitarist Henry Kaiser, most notably as part of the ad hoc grouping French Frith Kaiser Thompson with whom he recorded two albums. In 1997 he worked with long-time friend and band member Danny Thompson to record a concept album Industry that dealt with the decline of British industry. A year later he worked with early music expert Philip Pickett on the acclaimed Bones of All Men which fused renaissance tunes with contemporary music.

In recent years Thompson has devised and toured his show 1000 Years of Popular Music. The inspiration for this came when Playboy asked Thompson (and many other music industry figures) in 1999 for their suggestions for the "top ten songs of the millennium". Guessing that Playboy expected most people's lists to start at around 1950, Thompson took the magazine at its word and presented a list of songs from the 11th century to the present day. Perhaps not surprisingly, Playboy did not use his list, but the exercise gave him the idea for a show which takes a chronological trip through popular music across the ages. Thompson acknowledges that this is an ambitious undertaking, partly because he reckons that he is technically unqualified to sing 98% of the material, and partly because of the sparse musical setting he restricts himself to: besides his acoustic guitar, he's backed by singer/pianist Judith Owen and a percussionist/singer (Debra Dobkin). A typical performance would start with a medieval round, progress via a Purcell aria, Victorian music hall and Hoagy Carmichael and climax with Thompson's unique take on the Britney Spears hit "Oops!... I Did It Again".

In 2004 Thompson was asked to create the soundtrack music for the Werner Herzog documentary Grizzly Man. The score, which was recorded over a two-day period in December 2004, brought Thompson together with a group of improvisational musicians, mostly from the San Francisco Bay area; video footage from the sessions was edited into a mini-documentary, In the Edges, which was included with the DVD release of Grizzly Man.

In 2009 Thompson was commissioned to write a piece for the International Society of Bassists in honour of Danny Thompson. The resulting Cabaret of Souls, a musical play set in the underworld, has been performed in State College (Pennsylvania), London, and Los Angeles with a cast that includes Harry Shearer, Judith Owen, Debra Dobkin, Pete Zorn, either Danny Thompson or David Piltch, and a 12-piece string section conducted by Peter Askim. This suite was eventually commercially released in late 2012.

In 2013, Thompson collaborated with Jack Shit for a cover of the traditional "General Taylor" for the Sea shanty-compilation Son of Rogues Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs & Chanteys.

Retrospectives and tributes

Thompson has been well served by compilers of retrospective collections. These are partly aimed at curious new listeners who are interested in hearing more of him, but are also essential purchases for more committed fans, since they contain material which is unavailable elsewhere. 1976's (guitar, vocal) was a collection of unreleased material from the previous eight years of Thompson's appearances on the Island label. The 3-CD set Watching the Dark is a generous combination of his better-known songs and previously unreleased live and studio tracks. Action Packed is a compilation of tracks from his Capitol releases, plus three hard-to-find songs. Finally, in 2006, the independent label Free Reed released ', a 5-CD box set consisting almost entirely of previously unreleased performances of songs from throughout Thompson's long career.

Thompson's songs have been extensively covered; for example, Dimming of the Day has been performed by artists such as The Neville Brothers, Bonnie Raitt, Emmylou Harris, David Gilmour, The Blind Boys of Alabama, June Tabor, The Corrs and Alison Krauss and Union Station. There have been several tribute compilations of other artists' interpretations of his work, including: Capitol's Beat the Retreat: Songs by Richard Thompson and Green Linnet's The World Is a Wonderful Place: The Songs of Richard Thompson, both released in 1994.

Playing style

Thompson makes use of the "pick and fingers" technique (sometimes referred to as "hybrid picking") where he plays bass notes and rhythm with a pick between his first finger and thumb, and adds melody and punctuation by plucking the treble strings with his fingers. He also makes use of different guitar tunings, such as (low to high) CGDGBE, DADGBE, DADGAD, and more. This enables him to adapt traditional songs, as on Strict Tempo! and 1000 Years of Popular Music. Thompson occasionally makes use of a thumb-pick, playing in fingerstyle, the most notable example being on the motorcycle ballad "1952 Vincent Black Lightning."

Guitars

Electric

Thompson is often associated with the Fender Stratocaster guitar. He has made prominent use of Stratocasters, as he has a general preference for the sound of single coil pick-ups.

Prior to using a Stratocaster with Fairport Convention he used a Gibson Les Paul with P-90 pick-ups. he then switched to a late 60s Stratocaster. Since leaving Fairport Convention he has continued to use electric guitars with single coil pick-ups, most famously a late-1950s Stratocaster but also two custom built electrics by Danny Ferrington as well as other Stratocasters, various Telecaster-type guitars and, in the studio, a Danelectro U2.

As regards effects, he has made significant use of modulation and vibrato type effects pedals, most notably the Univibe and emulations thereof.

Thompson has made intermittent use of Roland's GK-1 pick-up and GL-2 synthesiser over the years. He made use of these devices on 1979's Sunnyvista album and has occasionally used them in concert.

Acoustic

Since the early 1990s Thompson has made prominent use of Lowden acoustic guitars for studio and live work. Before this he used a Martin 000-18 as well as instruments built by Danny Ferrington.

For live work his acoustic guitars are fitted with a Sunrise pick-up and an internal condenser microphone. The output from the pick-up is usually fed into some effects pedals, typically a delay pedal and a Univibe.

Brief discography

Only albums under Thompson's own name, and comprising only or mostly newly released material are included here. These are the albums that represent the solid corpus of his work as a songwriter and recording artist. For a more complete listing of his albums see the main Richard Thompson discography.

• Henry the Human Fly (1972)
• I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight (1974)
• Hokey Pokey (1975)
• Pour Down Like Silver (1975)
• First Light (1978)
• Sunnyvista (1979)
• Strict Tempo! (1981)
• Shoot Out the Lights (1982)
• Hand of Kindness (1983)
• Across a Crowded Room (1985)
• Daring Adventures (1986)
• Amnesia (1988)
• Rumor and Sigh (1991)
• Mirror Blue (1994)
• You? Me? Us? (1996)
• Mock Tudor (1999)
• The Old Kit Bag (2003)
• Front Parlour Ballads (2005)
• 1000 Years of Popular Music (2006)
• Sweet Warrior (2007)
• Dream Attic (2010)
• Cabaret of Souls (2012)
• Electric (2013)
• Acoustic Classics (2014)
• Still (2015)