REVIEW: Richard Thompson, Mock Tudor (Capitol)
- Don Share
Whatever the decade, whatever the trend, Richard Thompson has been with us from his folk-rock days in the 60's with Fairport Convention, to his 70's collaborations with former wife, Linda, all the way up through his quirky solo albums of the 80's and 90's. Dark, but wittily un-depressed lyrics underwritten by uncopyable guitar solos have always been his hallmarks. 1973's classic I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight and especially the singular and harrowing Shoot Out The Lights from 1982 (a must-own for anyone going through a divorce!), should be in everybody's record collection, and after that, there are about a dozen worthwhile albums, including this one, to investigate. Thompson is so deadly smart with a lyric and a guitar that you'll very likely end up curious about everything he's done; if so, this is a fine album to start with, or keep going with.
Working with producers who've been on the job with Elliot Smith, Beck, and Foo Fighters, and a band that includes veteran Dave Mattucks on drums, and two other Thompsons, son Teddy on guitar and vocals and Danny (no relation) on double bass, Mock Tudor is proof that time has not mellowed or dulled Thompson's remarkable skills. Perhaps more than its predecessors, this is a focused, richly detailed collection of songs that, as always, start off sounding odd and grow and grow on you.
One slight change is that the music here is a bit more on the radio-rootsy, i.e., Dave Matthews/Springsteeny side, than fans would expect. Still, you never heard those other guys sing about a "Cooksferry Queen," or an opportunist club-owner named Mulvaney who trades in mohair for tie-dye faded jeans. The opening track I'm describing growls like a train, and blows like a smokestack. "Sibella" features pounding, aching bass and drums, with a literate, but far from bookish lyric: "Some say you can learn a lot from books / Thrill-ride to second-hand living / Life is just as deadly as it looks / But fiction is more forgiving."
"Bathsheba Smile" is swelling and angry, as well, but even sharper is the self-explanatory "Two-Faced Love," which features inspirational lines like the cubist "Two-Faced love feels so wrong it must be right," and the characteristically wry couplet, "Pardon my naive caress / tenderfoot tenderness." Similarly wonderful are the no-pun intended "Hard On Me," a great grim thumper, and "Uninhabited Man," in which the rhythm section chips away at the melody the way life has worn down the guy who sings, "If there's no me then there's no sin."
Some of the songs are nearly country, like "Dry My Tears and Move On," and "Walking the Long Miles Home," which is about missing, literally the bus... instead of missing the woman. These are vintage clear Thompson vignettes: "The whole town's asleep / or maybe they're deep / in the old voulezvous." But exactly what country is it? "Sights and Sounds of London Town" features "Gillian... a Doncaster lass," so we know were not talkin', say, Nashville or Asbury Park.
Best of all is "That's All, Amen, Close the Door," almost Tom Waitsy in its bumptious grind, by way of some Jarvis Cocker irony ("There's beauty in what's brief / There's beauty in what's small / That's all.") and "Hope You Like the New Me," which I won't spoil by quoting. These songs are what we've counted on Thompson for all these years. They're not just sob-stories -- in every dark situation, Thompson finds bright new light. It's a little old-fashioned, even a bit scruffy, but you have to be thankful he's still making such music. As he sings in "Crawl Back Under My Stone," "I've got a nerve just showing my face, don't you think?"
