678 Richard and Linda Thompson - Shoot Out the Lights (1982)

 678 Richard and Linda Thompson - Shoot Out the Lights (1982)

Studio Album - Folk Rock


About the Act:

Richard Thompson is a folk rock singer/songwriter from London. Linda Peters (or Pettifer) is another English folk rock singer. Richard played with Fairport Convention in the late 60s. Shortly after leaving in 1971 he married Linda and they started being Richard and Linda Thompson. They released 6 studio albums together. They both went on to do more albums as themselves after they split up.

About the Album:

This was their sixth album as a duo, and was considerably aided in its creation by Gerry Rafferty.

My History with this Album:

None

Review:

Imagine a musical triangle. Oh, hang on, I don't mean the one that goes "ding", imagine a metaphoric and theoretical triangle in the realm of musical genres. At one corner you have Blues Rock, in particular the kind produced by Eric Clapton. At another corner is Folk Rock, kind of Fairport Convention and so on. At the third corner you have Country Rock, particularly the less commercial end, I'm thinking Emmylou Harris, and maybe James Taylor. Now imagine a point in the centre of the triangle. That's this album.

Of course, music is a continuum and the whole concept of genre is a convenience for reviewers and marketers. In some ways this album sounds like what I tend to call "singer-songwriter", although that doesn't necessarily help with understanding what that sounds like. 

So the guitar sound, Richard's job, is a Clapton-esque twangy blues sound (or Mark Knopfler). This is a dominant feature in the instrumentation, and is pretty well used. The singing is where the country influence is strongest, but not the full-on nasal twang of Dolly Parton or Kenny Rodgers, more like the lyrical tones of Alison Krauss or Eva Cassidy, at least when it comes to Linda. Linda's voice is pure and clear, with a slight country twang, a clarity a bit like Karen Carpenter's voice. It's a nice voice. Richard's voice is a bit more gutsy. They tend to lead alternate songs, and Richard's songs are the faster ones, Linda's are the slow ones. I liked Linda's more.

The songs themselves, the chords at times, and even the words, are where the folk label comes in. Not traditional or Celtic particularly, but folky nonetheless. At times there are some more unusual chord sequences, and one song has some less than straightforward rhythms going on. All reasonably good stuff.

As well as stylistically, the songs that Linda sings are the ones that I connected with most. Did She Jump Or Was She Pushed is my stand-out favourite, and is quite moving. Richard is OK, but I feel a bit more that he is not as invested in the songs.

All in all, a decent enough album, and I quite enjoyed it.

7.2/10


Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/album/4xX94uM6Kf972DJurGKnbb

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzv30H0qx5BcUtt2lvTzGGDNCP0fkbbNG

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoot_Out_the_Lights



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