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For an artist with the kind of deep back catalogue that Richard Thompson can boast, the anniversaries seem to come around thick and fast. 2024 marks the 55th of Fairport Convention’s ‘Liege And Lief’, still widely recognised as one of the all-time essential folk-rock albums and a ground-breaking landmark musically too; it is also the 50th anniversary of Richard & Linda Thompson’s ‘I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight’, another that is fondly remembered as an early seventies dark, gothic singer-songwriter classic. It won’t be too long before we’re talking about sixty years of Fairport either, but is Richard, at the age of 75, reliving former glories? Of course, he isn’t; this is a legend showing no signs of damping down the creative process, and with superb new electric album ‘Ship To Shore’ sailing into view, he sat down for a lengthy Zoom chat with Klof Mag to mull over everything RT including former band mates, surprising career break diversions, the writing process, guitar playing stamina, family and of course, the brand new album which I begin by pointing out is actually his first long player since 2018…
2018? Crikey, that is a long time. Basically, covid put a bit of a spanner in the works. Two and a half years really; we couldn’t tour and certainly couldn’t put out a record in that time. So that really hit the schedule pretty seriously. I did a lot of writing, which was very handy. The two EPs that we put out, I wrote this album, I wrote the next album, I wrote a musical play, and now I don’t know what to do with myself I’m so far ahead.
The material’s ready but not recorded, I assume?
The material’s there, and I’m sure I’ll change my mind before we actually get down to recording, but I do have a lot of stuff that I’d like to record.
Is there an element of the sea shanty creeping into the style and sound of the new record?
I think that’s just the cover, isn’t it? Curiously, I was reading an unpublished autobiography by a Cornish trawlerman, and I suppose I saw echoes of my own life in his work, and I suppose that inspired me to write songs about myself. There’s nothing about him at all, but it got my foot tapping, and it got my brain in the right place to start writing. I wouldn’t say that’s a real overlap, that’s got to be extremely subtle, more of an undertow than an undertone (laughs).
With a song like ‘The Fear Never Leaves You,’ you are leaning in again to darker subject matter. Is that where you prefer to go with your writing, or do you think people expect it of you to some degree?
I wouldn’t say I prefer it or that people expect it of me, although I wouldn’t know about that, but I would say you write about what moves you. Sometimes, if you hark on about the same thing over years, it’s because it keeps moving you. It keeps becoming an emotional reference point almost. I saw a TV documentary about the SAS in the Falklands War. You think, there weren’t that many major engagements, but these guys really suffered PTSD down the road, and they’re still traumatised. I thought it was extraordinary, didn’t think of it as anything that would have caused that kind of lasting damage to people. I’ve written about soldiers before, I’ve written about war before; there are things that stir you up, there are things that move you and things that get you being creative, so that was the jumping-off point for that song.
Then you have a song like ‘Maybe’, which is a lot more upbeat and bouncy…
I think bouncy is the right word, yes.
…which type of song do you find easier to write, or does it just depend on where your head is at on that day?
A song like ‘Maybe’ is really easier I think, it’s got an easier rhyme scheme, you can just roll those verses off pretty quickly. It’s probably condensed down from about 18 verses, it’s fun to write actually.
When do you hit a point with song writing where you know a song is finished? Do you arrive at a place where you think I can stop tinkering now or do you never stop tinkering?
I think that varies a lot; you can have a song where you don’t really mess around with it much after you’ve written it; you just think, “Well that’s it, that’s good”. The main test I think is always playing it in front of an audience. When you play something live, you hear it through their ears for the first time, and that can be a shock actually. Suddenly you see all the things wrong with the song, if there are any things wrong, it becomes very apparent when you play it to an audience. I don’t mean at the end when they clap or don’t clap, I mean when you’re actually singing it you become incredible self-conscious about the content of the song. Sometimes, that’s the only performance of the song ever, you think, “this is a mess; I’ll re-write it”, and you never do; you don’t even sing it in the bath; you just kind of dump it really, there’s been a lot of songs like that.
Now I have to ask, is there really one that really stands out in the memory as one you played live and immediately thought, “oh dear…no”?
Not really, because I’ve forgotten them. I try to just dump them and forget about them. Sometimes, like an old Jaguar or something, parts get recycled. You can use that bridge or that guitar riff somewhere else, but often, they just don’t work or get to that performance point. It’s handy if you’ve got people. You can trust who you can sing it to first before you go to an audience. That’s certainly a halfway stage that could be employed.
So, would your partner, Zara Phillips, be that person? Does she have a role to play, even if it’s just as a pair of ears, in the writing process?
Sometimes, yeah, but I think she’s almost too supportive, so I might not completely trust her (laughs). She can be very encouraging and very supportive, but sometimes you need a stricter critic. Being your own critic, that is the best really. I think there are other songs that don’t necessarily communicate, and I put things on record that I thought were really good, and I got no reaction whatsoever. Certain people might say, “Well, that’s my favourite track on the record,” and I think, a-ha, at last, I’ve found somebody who likes that song, but nobody else does! I don’t know what to make of that.
I guess you’re never going to know what every single listener feels…
You’re never going to know but you can get a good poll I think for popularity.
Well, in my opinion, on the new album, you have a song called ‘What’s Left To Lose’ that’s like a piece of low-hanging fruit in the sense that it just sounds like a song that had to be written. To my ears, it is one of those songs that works so well you can’t believe it hasn’t been around for decades.
Well I’ve got my fingers crossed that that is the case and no one has written that actual song before, you never know. I’ll know if somebody sues me. I do like that song, I’m glad you like it. I do think it’s a strong song, and in some ways, it’s the strongest song on the record, even though I’ve kind of buried it a bit in the running order. It’s going to be in the set for the live shows coming up which is great, I’m anticipating that it will be fun to play.
There’s something in those chords alongside those words that just aches, it almost hurts to listen to that, which is why it works so well.
I knew I should have tuned the guitars before we recorded it.
With a song like ‘Trust’ are you writing purely in character or does an element of the personal seep in?
I’m probably writing about people I know. Maybe it’s because I’m senile or something, but I tend to have conversations with dead people. In my mind, I’m not speaking out loud, walking down the street muttering, which is a sure sign that I need help. But in my mind, in my dreams, sometimes, I talk to people who’ve gone before, who’ve passed on. One of those is Sandy Denny, I think maybe because stuff was unresolved between us. I produced a couple of her records and it was always frustrating with Sandy because she was very one paced as a composer, she would write stuff that would be a slow 4/4 or a slow 3/4. She didn’t have a lot of change of tempo; we were always thinking, “We’ll do a cover or something just to speed things up”. Otherwise, her albums would have literally been one-pace all the way through. In my imaginary conversation with her, I say, “You know you can sing at the same pace, but you can just double the tempo of the backing. So, you have a song that goes twice as fast, but you’re still singing at the same tempo, have you thought about that?” and in my imaginary conversation, she says, “Ooh, that’s a good idea”. I wish I’d have had that idea 55 years ago, and we could have perhaps done something more interesting with some of her records. That’s really how that song started, and it’s almost me demonstrating to Sandy this is how you do it or me writing a song for her to do a cover of.
Does that explain the presence of ‘Let’s Jump The Broomstick’ on side two of her ‘North Star Grassman And The Ravens’ album?
Exactly, it explains that, and I wish we hadn’t done that in many senses. I wish we hadn’t just resorted to easy covers because her songs were really strong; there should have been no reason to do any kind of cover on a Sandy record; she should have been writing 100% of her albums, but she didn’t have the variation of pace of a Joni Mitchell or a Carole King. In a sense that made her less accessible, she had less of a friendly interactive point with the audience that would have made her the popular singer she should have been.
What do you think of her song, written while she was in her band Fotheringay, ‘Nothing More’ which is widely reported to be about you?
I know the song, but… I don’t know. I wouldn’t recognise myself in a Sandy song; that’s quite possible. I wish I had the lyrics now; I’ll have to go and check them out; I hadn’t really thought of that song in those terms.
During your writing process, are you visited by inspiration at inopportune moments, or can you maintain a better structure than that?
I tend to jot stuff down all the time, sitting on the bus, walking down the street you get ideas and if you’re smart, you’ll write them down right there and then. I totally lost something that I was writing yesterday in my head, and I couldn’t find a pen. I always carry a pen but for some reason I’d changed my shirt, and I didn’t have one with me so the idea’s gone, I just can’t remember what it was. A little note to self: if you want to be a writer, you really have to respond in the moment. I’m always jotting down, then when I get time, I’ll tend to work a lot harder on stuff to try to get stuff finished if I’m in a work mode. Sometimes there’s a deadline sometimes there isn’t, I just feel like writing and stuff’s flowing through then I’ll get up early, work through the morning and if it’s going well, I just keep going otherwise I’d knock off at lunch time and get back to other stuff.
I read in an interview yesterday Mark Knopfler talking about a ‘lay off’ in his guitar playing since Covid. Have you had any similar difficulties staying on top of your game?
No, I think the longest I go without playing is maybe at the end of a tour when I’m thinking it would be a good idea to rest my playing muscles. I like to keep the calluses there, but sometimes I feel my tendons could do with a rest, so I might lay off for a few days. Sometimes it could be a week if I’m travelling and I can’t get my hands on a guitar but I really like to keep it going every day if I can.
Linda Thompson also has a new album coming out, which I hear you had an involvement with; what was the nature of your contribution to Linda’s ‘Proxy Music’?
I tidied up some lyrics, wrote an extra verse (I can’t actually remember what I did), something lyrically on a track called ‘Three Shaky Ships’. Then I played guitar on another track, again I can’t remember, I played guitar and keyboard and something else… so that was fun. It turned out to be a very good record, there’s some fine performances on there and lots to enjoy; singer to singer, co-writer to co-writer there’s a lot of variety on that record. I hope it does well, as well as records do do these days, which is not too much, but I wish her success with it.
In a recent interview in The Guardian, Linda said, “I toured with family once, never again. Too fraught. You can’t tell your kids and grandkids they’re playing the wrong chord”. Have you any perspective on that?
Yes. Well, I tried to teach Teddy guitar when he was very young, he was six or seven I think, and I gave up. He was far too opinionated; really thought he knew best, and he knew how to do it. At that point, with all my kids, I thought they’re better off learning at school, or if they want to have guitar or keyboard lessons, they’re better off going somewhere else. I haven’t really changed my opinion on that. My grandson Zach, who is a very good musician, we might have sat down like twice and talked about guitar, but mostly, he’s a clever kid who gets it off records and watching other people. I can’t claim to be a hands-on teacher, I’m not sure I’d be good as a hands-on teacher in that way even though I run a guitar camp where I’m teaching guitar classes. It doesn’t seem to be about “put your finger here, put your other finger over there”; it’s more about “this is what I like about music; I hope you like the same things as I like”. More general philosophy, and I think my kids have picked up on that over the years. They have similar tastes to me, and I think they express music in similar ways. I’m very proud of my kids, the way that they’ve ploughed their own furrow and found their own niche in music, and I’m a fan of my kids’ music.
There are no creative family related projects in the works? I know you were involved in Zara Phillips last album (Meditation and KitKats) weren’t you?
Yeah, I played on it and produced it; that was nice. I love working with family when the opportunity arises. Teddy and I or me and Kami will play together, we did the ‘Thompson’ album [review], and I can’t see another one of those on the horizon. I could be wrong, but it needs somebody to organise it, which is never easy…
It’s not going to be you?
…it was Teddy last time; it might have to be Teddy next time as well.
How about your Fairport family? Were you ever offered the chance to rejoin them on a permanent basis? Is that something that ever would have interested you again?
Once you get to run your own band, it’s kind of hard to go back to being collaborative. It’s just an ego thing. I enjoy doing my own writing and deciding that I’m going to sing all the songs and I’m going to take all the solos (laughs). Always nice to play with the Fairport lads, that’s a nice thing to dip back into. We’re all doing a cruise together next year, so I’m sure there’ll be collaboration on that. As a permanent thing I just wouldn’t have considered it, I enjoy my own musical freedom too much.
Bob Dylan said that Fairport always did the best cover versions of his material, how did you feel when he covered your own ‘Vincent Black Lightning 1952’?
Yeah, it’s good. It’s very flattering when people cover your songs, sometimes you think what’s the point in them doing that? They’ve missed the point of the song (sometimes you think that), other times you think there’s ideas in the song that I’d never even considered, isn’t that wonderful? It’s a mixed bag usually.
Can you give me some examples?
I always say that one of my favourite covers is ‘The Great Valerio’ by Swan Arcade. There was also a really nice cover of that song by Mary Fahl, who used to be in The October Project, she did a really nice cover with a great video, vintage highwire footage. On the whole, it’s just flattering, gosh.
Have you heard ‘Dad’s Gonna Kill Me’ done thrash metal style by a band called DevilDriver?
No, but I like them already; they sound like very nice people. I’ve not heard a cover of that song; I wouldn’t have thought it was particularly coverable, but they’ve obviously found a way to do it.
Have you ever written with another singer in mind?
I would say yes, but having said that, I wouldn’t say which songs came out of that. When I was a duo with Linda I wrote with her voice in mind for sure, Fairport maybe with Sandy in mind, maybe not?
But you haven’t, say for example, written a song in a Johnny Cash style and then sent it to Johnny Cash?
I haven’t no, obviously I’m missing out here. I’m not thinking straight, not thinking commercially enough; it’s obviously a very good idea to do that. It’s a bit Brill Building really, isn’t it? A bit Nashville as well, in Nashville people do that sort of stuff all the time. I just live in my own little world really; emotionally, stylistically, geographically, geologically, so I’m not always thinking along those terms, going to have to change my ways.
Are there any artists you would like to have collaborated with but just haven’t found the right moment?
I’m a reluctant collaborator but when I do it, I think the results are often very good, I just find it hard to get around to it. I avoid it if possible. I wrote some great songs with Swarb [Dave Swarbrick]; in Fairport, we did some good collaborations here and there, but it feels like a compromise even though sometimes the results are better than you expect. A song like ‘Persuasion’, which is basically myself and Tim Finn, we sat in a room together for a while, but then he said, “I’m going to go away and write some lyrics for your tune”. It started out as a tune in an Australian feature film, when he’d written the lyrics, I thought they were really good and they fit the song really well, it turned out to be a really good song in spite of my misgivings about the process. As I say, I’m reluctant, but when it happens, sometimes it’s magical.
What is the ultimate job satisfaction for you? Is it writing a great song, or more about the performance?
I think job satisfaction comes from the whole cycle; you write something, you record it, tour it, and come back again, write it, record it, tour it… there’s satisfaction at each point of those processes. Probably being rewarded is playing live in front of an audience, a feeling like you’ve communicated something—that you dipped into your own heart, and you communicated something to other people’s hearts, some shared human experience.
What are you currently listening to?
Currently listening to Ooh, I wouldn’t say anything new. What I’ve been doing, someone asked me to do a radio programme, so I’ve been listening to stuff for that. Mahler, Shostakovich, Stravinski, Elgar, Bix Beiderbecke, Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, The Waterson’s, Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell… I think that’s what I’ve been listening to for the last week or two.
For one last question, I wanted to touch on an area that doesn’t get covered so often in interviews with you. Speaking as someone who grew up around the antique trade, I am curious to know a little about your time spent as an antique dealer in the mid-seventies.
It was a fairly short period, about 1976-77; I put my musical career on hold because I was a bit lost, actually. I couldn’t figure out what to do. My audience started disappearing; I wasn’t Glam Rock; I wasn’t Metal or Prog Rock, and it wasn’t until Punk came along that I kind of re-found myself. So, I thought I’d take a year off, and this friend of mine was asking me if I wanted to be a partner in this shop he’s got in London. So, I thought that would be fun; we were basically a mid-level antique shop. We did house clearances where they’d want you to take everything, so you’d do that, then immediately dump the wardrobes and the beds on somebody else, someone who just does wardrobes or beds, junk furniture and stuff. We’d sell pretty much everything else, then I’d go down to Brick Lane at 4am at weekends; we were probably buying a lot of stolen goods without realising it, actually. They’d go to Brick Lane, then they’d go on to France in a hurry. We were on Crawford Street, which is just off of Baker Street, fairly central London, and the nice thing was people would drop in every day sometimes, and you’d get to know this really nice clientele. But I was too nice to the old ladies, you know, sometimes they’d come in and say I’ve got this Georgian this, that and the other, and I’d go round their houses and think, “shit, this is actually worth a lot of money”, but I’d tell them, I’d say “look you should put this in an auction, don’t give it to me, this is far too good” so I wasn’t ruthless enough. We set up a market stall in Church Street on a Saturday where we’d sell the real junk; anything that was not vaguely antique-worthy, we’d shove on the market stall. It was amazing how everything went; you could put something out for a year, and (it wouldn’t take that long) it would be gone. I got a pair of Chinese lions, and I thought, “Are these actual Ming dynasty or are they copies?” and somebody came in and said, “I’ll give you £60 for them”. I said, “I don’t know what they are, don’t know what they’re worth, but if you want to take a gamble, that’s fine.” Anyway, they were Ming; they were worth about six grand or something, but anyway, that kind of thing happens occasionally, doesn’t it? After a year or so, I doubt I made any money, actually I probably broke even and I wanted to get back to music. I thought, “Well, I’ve got more talent as a musician than I have as an antique dealer, that’s for sure.”
Ship to Shore (25th May 2024)
Richard Thompson’s Ship To Shore is out on 25th May via New West Records. The album will be available across digital platforms, compact disc, and standard black vinyl. A limited “Deep Blue” colour vinyl edition of 500 with a bonus orange flexi disc featuring a demo of the song “Trust” will be available via Rough Trade. An autographed compact disc edition and a limited Orange & Yellow Marble colour vinyl edition featuring a 5×7 archival print autographed by Richard Thompson will be available via Independent Retailers and is available for pre-order NOW via: http://newwst.com/shiptoshore
Richard Thompson On Tour:
05/25/24 – Cambridge, UK – Corn Exchange #
05/26/24 – Bristol, UK – Beacon #
05/27/24 – York, UK – Barbican #
05/29/24 – Glasgow, UK – Royal Concert Hall #
05/30/24 – Gateshead, UK – Glasshouse #
05/31/24 – Manchester, UK – Aviva Studios at Manchester Factory International#
06/01/24 – Stoke-on-Trent, UK – Victoria Hall #
06/03/24 – Birmingham, UK – Symphony Hall #
06/04/24 – Cardiff, UK – New Theatre #
06/05/24 – Portsmouth, UK – Guildhall #
06/06/24 – Brighton and Hove, UK – Dome Concert Hall #
06/08/24 – London, UK – Royal Albert Hall #
07/12/24 – Woodstock, NY – Levon Helm Studios +
07/13/24 – Woodstock, NY – Levon Helm Studios +
07/17/24 – Earlville, NY – Earlville Opera House *
07/20/24 – 07/21/24 – Guelph, ONT – Hillside Festival*
07/23/24 – Nelsonville, OH – Stuart Opera House *
07/24/24 – Kent, OH – The Kent Stage *
07/26/24 – Bethlehem, PA – Musikfest Café *
7/27/24 – Harrisburg, PA – Whitaker Center *
07/28/24 – Cape May, NJ – Cape May Convention Hall*
10/18/24 – New York, NY – The Town Hall #
08/23/25 – 08/30/25 – Venice, Italy – Harmony Voyages- Gems of the Adriatic Cruise
* Solo Show
# Full Band
+ RT & Friends
