Top Artists – Richard Thompson (also Linda Thompson)

Richard & Linda Thompson – What to Listen For

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Richard (and Linda) Thompson

More Records with Specific Advice on What to Listen For

The biggest problems with this record would be obvious to even the casual listener: gritty, spitty vocals; lack of richness; lack of bass; no real space or transparency, etc. etc.

When we came across this killer copy in our most recent shootout, we knew we had something special as it had very few of the problems above. 

The Carthage pressings did not do nearly as well in our shootout as the best imports, no surprise there as the early UK Island records were mastered by one of our favorite engineers.

Avoid the original domestic Island pressings mastered by Kendun. They come in last in our shootouts.

TRACK LISTING

Side One

Streets of Paradise
For Shame of Doing Wrong
The Poor Boy Is Taken Away
Night Comes In

Side Two

Jet Plane in a Rocking Chair
Beat the Retreat
Hard Luck Stories
Dimming of the Day

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Richard & Linda Thompson – Bigger, Taller, Wider, Deeper

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Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Richard (and Linda) Thompson

One of the qualities we don’t talk about nearly enough on the site is the SIZE of a record’s presentation. Some copies of the album don’t extend all the way to the outside edges of the speakers, and don’t seem to take up all the space from the floor to the ceiling. Other copies do, creating a huge soundfield from which the instruments and voices positively jump out of the speakers. 

When you hear a copy that can do that, needless to say (at least to anyone who’s actually bought some of our best Hot Stamper pressings) it’s an entirely different listening experience.

With constant improvements to the system Shoot Out is now so powerful a recording that we had no choice but to add it to our Top 100 list in 2014, but we would go even further than that and say that it would belong on a list of the Top Ten Best Sounding Rock Records of All Time.

The guitars are HUGE — they positively leap out of the speakers on the title cut, freeing themselves from a studio that seems already to be the size of a house.

Not long ago we played an amazing copy of The Sky Is Crying, one of the biggest — and by that we mean tallest, widest and deepest — sounding records we have ever heard. This album is every bit as big. It’s nothing less than astounding.

There is the kind of solid, powerful kick to the drums on every track that only the best of the best rock records ever display, the Back in Blacks and Zep IIs, with deep punchy bass augmenting the drums, just as it does on the Hot Stamper pressings of those two titles.

It’s no exaggeration to say that this record should put to shame 99% of all the rock records you have ever heard.

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Richard & Linda Thompson – Shoot Out The Lights

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  • An outstanding copy of The Thompsons’ final album with big, bold, energetic Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER on both sides – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Without a doubt this is the best record Richard and Linda Thompson ever made
  • Dynamic, huge, lively, powerful and musical – a real Demo Disc
  • A Top 100 album, and clearly Thompson’s Masterpiece of Grungy Guitar Rock
  • 5 stars: “Shoot Out The Lights found them rallying their strengths to the bitter end; it’s often been cited as Richard Thompson’s greatest work, and it’s difficult for anyone who has heard his body of work to argue the point.”

Without a doubt, this is the best record Richard and Linda Thompson ever made together, possibly the best record Thompson was ever involved with, but it also holds one other important distinction, one of great interest to us audiophiles: it’s the BEST SOUNDING record he (they) ever made as well.

Turn it up good and loud and you will be amazed at how dynamic the guitar solos are.

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Richard and Linda Thompson – Hokey Pokey

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  • Excellent sound for this classic Richard and Linda Thompson album with both sides earning seriously good grades 
  • Clearly one of the better copies in our shootout – much more body, punchier bass and more detail than most pressings
  • Everything you want in the sound of a good British Folk Rock album is here in abundance – enjoy!
  • Allmusic 4 Stars: “The Thompsons, from the opening Irish fiddle derivation of a Chuck Berry riff, through Linda’s exquisite performance of “A Heart Needs a Home,” to their cover of Mike Waterson’s “Mole in a Hole” which closes the record, once again create a timeless amalgam of folk and rock…”

This is one of Richard and Linda Thompson’s better releases, their second in fact, following the luminous I Want to See the Bright Lights Shine from a year earlier. Rich and full-bodied, with big bass and gobs of studio ambience, this pressing presents the music the way it was meant to be heard (more…)

Fairport Convention – What We Did On Our Holidays

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  • An outstanding UK copy with solid Double Plus (A++) sound or close to it, and the first copy to hit the site in years – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Bigger and bolder, with more bass, more energy, and more of that “you-are-there-immediacy” of ANALOG that set the best vintage pressings apart from reissues, CDs, and whatever else you care to name
  • 4 1/2 stars: “… more than simply being a collection of good songs, it allowed Fairport to achieve its greatest internal balance, and indeed one of the finest balances of any major folk-rock group.”

The “haunting, ethereal” vocals of the lovely Sandy Denny (or Alexandra Elene McLean Denny as she’s listed on the sleeve) are sublime here. Some of you may recognize her voice from a ditty called ‘Battle of Evermore’, found on a grayish ’70s rock album that no one even bothered to give a name. Wonder what ever became of that group? No doubt by now their story is lost to the sands of time. I have to say I thought the music was pretty good though.

This vintage Island pressing has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern records can barely BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing signs of coming back. If you love hearing INTO a recording, actually being able to “see” the performers, and feeling as if you are sitting in the studio with the band, this is the record for you. It’s what vintage all analog recordings are known for — this sound. (more…)

Richard & Linda Thompson – Loud Versus Live

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Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Richard (and Linda) Thompson

Yet another recording that really comes alive when you Turn Up Your Volume.

I’ve seen Richard Thompson on a number of occasions over the years, and as loud as my stereo will play, which is pretty darn loud, I’ve never been able to make his guitar solos 20 dB louder than everything else, because they’re simply not on the record that way. That’s why live music can’t be reproduced faithfully in the home: the dynamic contrasts are much too great for the typical listener, or his stereo. 

Having said that, when you actually do turn this record up, way up, you get the feeling of hearing live music, and that’s not easy to do.

Only the best recordings, in my experience, can begin to give you that feeling. (And of course it helps to have big dynamic speakers.)

On the best copies the sound is very dynamic, the soundstage HUGE. The overall presentation in terms of size and weight just makes you want to turn your stereo up as loud as it will go. In that sense, it has some of the qualities of “live” music, because live music is loud.

We do shootouts for this Top 100 title on a regular basis. To see what we might have in stock, please click here. (more…)

Richard Thompson – Strict Tempo!

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Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Richard (and Linda) Thompson

  • Richard Thompson’s superb instrumental album makes its Hot Stamper debut here with Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it on both sides
  • The sound is anchored by an exceptionally fat, rich, punchy low end on the best copies, and this pressing shows you just how big and punchy it can get
  • An original Elixer pressing, Thompson’s own label
  • “… on Strict Tempo! Thompson lets loose on an instrumental collection of traditional British and Celtic jigs and reels, with a swinging Duke Ellington cover thrown in for variety and one new original offered as the finale… it shows one of the finest guitarists on Earth showing just how well he can play, and that’s always a pleasure to hear.”

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Richard & Linda Thompson / Sunnyvista – Our Shootout Winner from 2012

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Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Richard (and Linda) Thompson

It took two copies, each with a single White Hot Stamper side, to create the All Time Best Sounding version of Sunnyvista, an album AMG calls “…the wittiest and most joyous album Richard & Linda made together.”

None of the domestic copies we played were more than passable, and even worse, most of the Brit originals we played were almost as smeary, veiled and opaque. There was only one way to get top sound on both sides, and that was to make a Two Pack with the best two sides of the best two copies. The two good sides here just KILL the competition in every way.

They’re bigger, more present, more energetic and just plain more FUN than any other sides we played. If you’re a fan this is the only way we know of to hear this album sound the way it should.

Just in case you don’t care to take our word for how mediocre the average side is, play the “bad” sides of the two records, both of which earned a single plus grade (A+) — they were doing some things right, but for the most part left a lot to be desired. When you play them you will no doubt hear what we mean. (more…)

Richard & Linda Thompson / Pour Down Like Silver – Our Shootout Winner from 2015

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Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Richard (and Linda) Thompson

The biggest problems with this record would be obvious to even the casual listener: gritty, spitty vocals; lack of richness; lack of bass; no real space or transparency, etc. etc.

When we came across this copy we knew we had something special as it had very few of the problems above. 

The Carthage pressings did not do well in our shootout, no surprise as these early Island records were mastered at one of our favorite cutting houses here in the Southland. (more…)

Richard & Linda Thompson / Shoot Out The Lights – The Best Sounding Record of the Decade?

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Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Richard (and Linda) Thompson

Without a doubt this is the best record Richard and Linda Thompson ever made together, possibly the best record Thompson was ever involved with, but it also holds one other important distinction, one of great interest to us audiophiles: it’s the BEST SOUNDING record he (they) ever made as well.

As I was playing the finalists for side two (at ear-splitting levels I might add) an odd thought crossed my mind. Where had I heard this kind of monstrous, punchy bass and these soaring, perfectly distorted guitars, so big and so powerful, before? There was something about the sound – the awesome energy, the freedom from compression or spatial restraint of any kind – that was strangely familiar from another shootout.

After a minute’s deliberation the answer came to me: I was remembering the feeling I got from the White Hot Stamper of Led Zeppelin II we played not long ago.

Yes, that’s the album that it most closely resembles. As outlandish as it may seem, the rock power of Shoot Out the Lights has much more in common with the rock power of Zep II than any other record I can think of.

To be sure, the vast majority of people, including the vast majority of audiophiles, have never heard a top quality RL Zep II played at extremely loud levels on a big speaker system in a dedicated room. Nor in all probability will they ever have the chance.

But I sure have, quite a few in fact. If anyone knows that sound I do. I’ve dedicated the past forty years of my efforts in audio to reproducing records with the Big Rock Sound like Zep II. There’s really none bigger in my opinion. (more…)