Salut! Live

Andrew Curry writes: We think that Richard Thompson’s new record, Ship to Shore, out today, is his 27th studio album since he left Fairport Convention, including the six he made with his first wife Linda and the record he made with his namesake Danny. But we may have miscounted. He’s our Artist of the Week at our Facebook group.

Thompson has recently celebrated his 75th birthday, and in April there was an extended interview with him by Tom Pinnock in the pages of the British music magazine Uncut, which walked him round some of his teenaged haunts in London. (There are also some extracts online).

They wander down Charing Cross Road to Covent Garden, past Denmark Street, where there are still musical instrument shops, and past Watkins, the bookshop where he bought the books that led him to his Sufi faith.

The interview captures well Thompson’s droll humour. Asked about Woodstock, where he recorded Ship to Shore, he tells Pinnock,

I think we missed the vibe by 6o years. It's a bit touristy now, every other shop has a case of crystals. I wanted to get out of New Jersey because it was a bit dull... We visited the basement at Big Pink - there's an energy there, definitely, the sound molecules have altered the room somehow.

It’s apparently true, by the way, that he was asked to join The Band, not once but twice, but at times when the group was—in Thompson’s view—pretty dysfunctional. 

Ship to Shore, like his previous record 13 Rivers, is fairly uptempo, and Pinnock asks Thompson about this:

Well, it takes a lot to keep me awake. 13 Rivers was more up-tempo and since then I've been putting slower acoustic songs on those two EPs I did during lockdown. The band are playing on every track too, which gives it a bit of continuity... On some songs I was thinking of The Beatles or Abba - someone said in every four bars of a Beatles song something different happens. I'm just trying to live up to the moptops. They leave a long shadow. 

Pinnock worries that Thompson might be about to call an end to his career. He started so young that he’s been at this for almost fifty years, and the lyrics to the song Roll On, on the record, say, “"Thank you all for your love down the years... It's near the end now, when the curtain's coming down."

But fortunately not:

I've already written the next album—I've got too much time on my hands. "We Roll" might come across as a bit world-weary, but I like the touring lifestyle. I love being on a bus, it's fabulous... Once you get into the rhythm, you can really sleep deeply. It's fun. After about six weeks you're ready to kill everybody, but apart from that it's fine.

He’s touring the UK right now, and the tour dates are on his website. There are still tickets for most shows, including the concert at the Royal Albert Hall in a week that is billed as his “birthday concert”, with guests.

Our Song of the Day, from Ship to Shore, is Singapore Sadie, partly because there’s quite a lot of subtlety in the lyrics. 

More on Richard Thompson on Salut! Live.