A nice sunny Monday afternoon, but cold. I am sitting in the kitchen listening to Richard Thompson. As I can't think of anything new to tell you about today I thought I would dust off this old story I wrote about Richard Thompson quite a few years ago. ...........................................................................................It was in the summer of 69 that I first heard the name of Richard Thompson. I was still at school doing my A Levels but I got a job for the summer at Freeman's Mail Order warehouse in Peterborough. My elder brother worked there as well and he got some of his friends from Northampton Art School jobs there. I was very impressed with these art students who all had long hair and seemed to know a lot about music. One of the albums they introduced me to was What We Did On Our Holidays by Fairport Convention. I was so taken with it that I got my own copy. Fairport had two geniuses, Sandy with her singing and Richard with his guitar playing.
Sandy Denny became my favourite female singer of all time, and my favourite Fairport track was Meet On The Ledge which was written by Richard Thompson. I became a huge Fairport fan and to this day I still play that album and it hasn't dated at all. I got the follow up Unhalfbricking which was almost as good with Sandy singing Who Knows Where The Time Goes.Then they brought out Liege And Lief' which was quite stunning and I played it nonstop.With this seminal album they had invented the genre of English Folk Rock. It is one of the greatest albums of all time.
Sandy left the band after this and I bought Full House which was a good album but I missed the female vocals. Richard left the group after this and my interest began to wane although I did buy Babbacombe Lee which was about the true story of John 'Babbacombe' Lee the man they could not hang. I was at college myself by then and I remember sitting up one night debating with my friends if he was guilty or not. I also bought The History Of Fairport Convention,a double album. I still followed Sandy's career with Fotheringay and I bought Dave Swarbrick's album Swarb. I saw Fairport Convention at Glastonbury in 2009. They were on in the Acoustic Tent just before Bruce Springsteen played on the Pyramid Stage.
I didn't really follow Richard Thompson's solo career for a long time. I don't think he was interested in fame and fortune and I heard none of his albums for a long time although my mate Fred did give me the First Light album by Richard And Linda Thompson. Richard had become a Sufi around this time and lived in a commune in Suffolk. I got quite interested in Sufism myself in the late 70's when I moved to Bradford On Avon because there was a group of them living at Barton Farm and my mate Kevin lived there and I read some of the books. One of them was by Pir Inayat Vilayet Khan. It really impressed me. Sufism is a mystical sect of Islam, but Richard seems to have escaped the vitriol that was heaped on poor old Cat Stevens when he converted to Islam. I think that explains why Richard was off the radar for a long while. It was 1996 that I bought my first Richard Thompson solo album. It was when there was a short lived little CD shop right here in Westbury next to the Ludlow pub. I wanted to support my local record shop so I went in and he didn't have much stock but I came across a double album called You, Me,I. I bought it out of curiosity and really liked it. One side was electric with a band and the other side was acoustic solo.
In 2001 I heard the song Beeswing. I remember exactly where I was, it was in a pub in Ireland and it stopped me in my tracks. I thought it was one of the best songs I had ever heard and I had to have it. I saw it on a stall at the Trowbridge Folk Festival on an album called Action Packed a Richard Thompson compilation. That album is brilliant,every song a gem and if you want to get a friend into Richard Thompson then give them a copy of this album.
Addendum: I wrote that piece in 2012 and have seen Richard several times since then and bought lots more albums.
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