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Richard Thompson is one of the most enduring contemporary musicians in Britain, having been active since the late sixties, initially with Fairport Convention, then in partnership with his ex-wife Linda Thompson, and finally as a solo artist up to the present day. Having grown up listening to Django, Les Paul, and the early rock and rollers, he refined a recognizable style that combines flat and fingerstyle and ventures into the most rugged territories of folk rock. Certainly, time has relegated him to that category of artists who enjoy the unconditional love of a select group of enthusiasts, as well as respect and admiration from industry insiders. Not a legacy in his, but rather the result of uncommon talents both in terms of composition and from an instrumental standpoint.
“Mock Tudor" was released in 1999 and is yet another valuable record in a long and dignified career. For me, it is also the best one, excluding those with the original group. A work that features more sparse and essential arrangements compared to previous productions, thanks to the mixing work by Rothrock and Schnapf. Don’t they remind you of anything? No? What if I mention Either / Or? Elliott Smith? The two manage to highlight Thompson's innate elegance, and his emotionally charged phrasing does the rest. What comes out is a record without any real weak points.
In a place without a future, this is where our future lies.
Thompson takes us on a journey through the places and sounds of London with an album as enveloping as a gentle spring rain. It is a proletarian London that the songwriter narrates, a cycle of songs about suburban heroes and their dreams, signals of daily life that mix a bit of harsh romanticism with a much more present and pronounced cynicism. Stories that traverse the folds of the soul and focus on themes of human and social imperfection. The clothes we dress up in to face a new day, in this life where everything fades, diminishes, becomes elusive. And we will start over every day pretending nothing is wrong, because this system does not compromise with our humanity.
Life is mortal as it seems, but fiction is more forgiving.
The tracks take on the most diverse, sometimes unexpected forms, as in the rhythmic “Crawl Back", a song that seems to come from the Police's repertoire. The raw lyrics sometimes contrast with the surface cheerfulness of some pieces. This is the case with the opening "Cooksferry Queen", the queen at whose feet snakes dance, unfolding like a track with an Irish flavor and an almost rockabilly pace, embellished by the acrobatic flights of a harmonica. Women continue to be the protagonists of the stories narrated in Mock Tudor, whether they are alluring creatures of the night (“Batsheeba Smiles”) or pretentious bourgeois newly arrived in town (“Sibella”). Yet, Thompson does not forget his own great technical skills and showcases one of his most successful solos in the superb “Hard on Me”, certainly among the most beautiful tracks on the album.
We like the new Richard Thompson, an artist who has managed to preserve his own purity and who has made the continuous search for emotions his creed, in the manner of the old troubadours. Like many icons of the old guard, he has lost the commercial and public recognition of the good old days, but if anything, this new, more intimate and sophisticated dimension highlights his enviable expressive capabilities even more. And at 71 years old, we certainly can't ask for more from him.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Bathsheba Smiles (03:54)
Bathsheba smiles
She smiles and veins turn to ice
She smiles and heads bow down
She works the room
Air-kisses every victim twice
She spreads her joy around
Do you close your eyes to see miracles
Do you raise your face to kiss angels
Do you float on air to hear oracles
Bathsheba smiles, smiles
Bathsheba smiles, smiles
No doubt can cross her mind
Cross her mind
Bathsheba knows
She knows you better than yourself
Confess it on your knees
She shares her love
And sharing love is sharing wealth
Dig in your pockets please
Do you close your eyes to see miracles
Do you raise your face to kiss angels
Do you float on air to hear oracles
Bathsheba smiles, smiles
Bathsheba smiles, smiles
No doubt can cross her mind
No pain no gain's a strain
But she never seems to hurt
Catwalk pilgrims sing this song
Hello heaven, goodbye dirt
And no hair shirt
Do you close your eyes to see miracles
Do you raise your face to kiss angels
Do you float on air to hear oracles
Bathsheba smiles, smiles
Bathsheba smiles, smiles
No doubt can cross her mind
Do you close your eyes
Do you raise your face
Bathsheba smiles, smiles
Bathsheba smiles, smiles
Bathsheba smiles
02 Cooksferry Queen (04:12)
Well there's a house in an alley
In the squats and low-rise
Of a town with no future
But that's where my future lies
It's a secret, but no secret
It's a rule, but no rule
Where you find the darkest avenue
There you'll find the brightest jewel
Now my name it is Mulvaney
And I'm known quite famously
People speak my name in whispers
What higher praise can there be
But I'd trade my fine mohair
For tied-dyes and faded jeans
If she wanted me some other way
She's my Cooksferry Queen
She gave me one pill to get bigger
She gave me one pill to get small
I saw snakes dancing all around her feet
And dead men coming throught the wall
Well I'm the prince of this parish
I've been ruthless and I've been mean
But she blew my mind as she opened my eyes
She's my Cooksferry Queen
Yeaaaaah
Well she's got every rare perfection
All her looks beyond compare
She's got dresses that seem to float in the wind
Pre-Raphaelite curls in her hair
She could get the lame to walking
She could get the blind to see
She could make wine out of Thames river water
She could make a believer out of me
Yes I'd trade it all tomorrow
All the wicked things I've been
She's my bright jewel of the alley
She's my Cooksferry Queen
Yes I'd trade it all tomorrow
All the wicked things I've been
She's my bright jewel of the alley
She's my Cooksferry Queen
Oooooh
07 Sibella (04:15)
Oh some girls hold the ace, the deuce, the trey
X-ray the deck to see what's coming
Mary Antoinette she smiled that way
Easy to smile when the luck is running
Like a myth you rode in from the west
From the go you had my button pressed
Did the tea-time of your soul
Make you long for wilder days?
Did you never let Jack Kerouac
Wash over you in waves?
Sibella, we don't make sense together
But my heart's with you
Sibella, I found myself
Strange but true, strange but true
Some say you can learn a lot from books
Thrill right to second-hand living
Life is just as deadly as it looks
But fiction is more forgiving
You took chances well within your means
Salon hair and creases in your jeans
All those lonely winters long
Did you really think it through
Did you really ache for me like I really ached for you
Sibella, we don't make sense together
But my heart's with you
Sibella, I found myself
Strange but true, strange but true
Sibella, we don't make sense together
But my heart's with you
Sibella, I found myself
Strange but true, strange but true
Strange but true, strange but true
Strange but true
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