Created between three and five hundred years ago, they have become synonymous with modern folk music since the 1950s. 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. 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. In one of the most arresting passages of the book, he describes crawling over to Jeannie a few yards away. 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.

He talks about getting bored of books by Pete Townshend and Keith Richards when they go past the early years: “Once you’re playing Scunthorpe for the 30th time, unless someone gets murdered in the audience, it’s not that interesting. Other roles have included South Asia bureau chief, Capital Markets editor, and Philippines Correspondent. While 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 title), with classmate Hugh Cornwell, later lead singer and guitarist of the Stranglers, on bass guitar. For this reason, the Thompsons' fans often refer to the Shoot Out the Lights tour as "The Tour from Hell". The album the Thompsons were touring, Shoot Out the Lights, was big on US college rock radio, its songs brilliant and tough (titles like Walking on a Wire and Did She Jump Or Was She Pushed?

I think it's important though, that if you're a musician, you know best the kind of record you want to make, and that they should also trust your judgement in terms of artwork and sleeves. Largely on the strength of Thompson's playing, Boyd took them under his wing and signed them to his Witchseason production and management company. and Acoustic Rarities, an album of new recordings of some of the more obscure songs in the Thompson catalogue, some previously existing only as cover versions. The performances, with a backing band including both Simon Nicol and Dave Mattacks of Fairport Convention, were seen as strong, [37] [38] but the tension between Richard and Linda was all too obvious.

He played a solo which quotes from Django, from Charlie Christian, you know, an incredibly sophisticated little solo. Chrysalis Records did not take up their option to renew the contract, and the Thompsons found themselves without one. About a year later, Joe Boyd signed the Thompsons to his small Hannibal label and a new album was recorded. 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.Here he is on the edges: at the famed 14 Hour Technicolor Dream event in Alexandra Palace 1967, watching Yoko Ono’s performance art as John Lennon wanders around. 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. His virtuosity puts him in the same league as more celebrated axe heroes like Jimmy Page, and his breaks would not sound out of place on a Led Zeppelin album. It was during this tour that Thompson and Covey developed an intimate relationship, and during that month, Richard and Linda Thompson separated.

s (guitar, vocal) was a collection of unreleased material from the previous eight years of Thompson's appearances on the Island label. He's one of those names who are often quoted as 'influential', yet his public profile is only a couple of feet above sea-level. The new LP is unlikely to have the public suddenly screaming over the man who's been described as looking like a 'typical polytechnic lecturer', but in his own relaxed way he will probably win people over gradually, whilst maintaining that fabled position of artistic independence. Record Collector (magazine): 5 stars out of 5 -- "The tensions brought out an intensity in Linda's singing and a ferocity in Richard's playing. 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.Anniversary re-issue of Richard Thompson’s 1976 collection of rarities with Fairport Convention, Linda Thompson and solo. An easy-to-navigate digital replica of the weekday print edition and FT Weekend, available on your desktop, laptop, tablet and phone.