Richard Thompson Austin

While vastly underrated by the public at large, British singer-songwriter Richard Thompson has amassed a rabid cult following with his virtuosic guitar-playing and impeccable songwriting craftsmanship–first as part of the legendary folk-rock band Fairport Convention, then in a musical partnership with former wife Linda Thompson, and finally as a solo artist…

There are few singer/songwriters who have garnered the kind of widespread critical acclaim for such a lengthy career as Richard Thompson. From his earliest days with the British folk/rock band Fairport Convention, it was clear that Thompson was not only a uniquely talented guitarist with a distinctive style that owed as much to the Uillean pipes playing of Billy Pigg as it did the rock and roll of Chuck Berry, but also a songwriter with a dark vision, a writer who John Mellencamp admits could say more in one line than Mellencamp could in a whole song.

Those who define everything in strict, unflexible color terms consider all black South Louisiana sounds zydeco and all white sounds from that region Cajun. However, Beausoleil, an obviously white group, open this release with a signature zydeco tune, Clarence Garlow's "Bon Temps Roulet." While they sometimes ventured a bit afield, as with the concluding "Island Zydeco," much of Beausoleil's fare artfully crossed genres and successfully combined divergent influences and material. This disc should satisfy audiences regardless of idiomatic preference.