Richard Thompson

Thompson and singer Linda Peters started a relationship when Peters collaborated on his solo album ‘Henry the Human Fly’ with her and the couple got married in 1972. They have a son together: Teddy Thompson, who is also a musician. They separated in December 1981.

He started an affair with grew closer to Nancy Covey while on his US tour for ‘Shoot Out the Lights’. The couple got married in 1985, after he divorced Peters, and they both moved to California, where Thompson made his working base.

Thompson was born in Notting Hill, London, England, to a Scotland Yard detective. He was born in the kind of family where all the members were inclined towards music in their own way; his father was a recreational guitarist.

He attended the William Ellis School in Highgate, London, where, still inclined towards music and guitar, he formed his first band ‘Emil and the Detectives’ with his fellow student Hugh Cornwell—future lead guitarist and singer of ‘The Stranglers’.

At 18 Thompson started playing with ‘Fairport Convention’—folk rock and electric folk band. His music impressed the American producer Joe Boyd and he decided to mentor him and signed the band to his Witchseason production and management company.

In 1969, ‘Fairport Convention’s’ album ‘What We Did on Our Holidays’ was released and Thompson started to get recognition as a songwriter. His compositions: ‘Meet on the Ledge’, ‘Crazy Man Michael’ and ‘Sloth’ gained immense popularity.

Thompson decided to leave the band in 1971 after the band’s van crashed on the way home from a gig at Mothers, a club in Birmingham. The band lost their drummer Martin Lamble and Thompson lost his girlfriend.

He released his solo album ‘Henry the Human Fly’ in 1972; he collaborated with artists like: Andy Roberts, Sandy Denny, Linda Peters, etc. The album is now very famous but at the time it was ridiculed by the press.

In 1974, Thompson and Linda Peters, now a couple, founded an electric band, ‘Sour Grapes’, with ex-‘Fairport Convention’s’ Dave Pegg on bass and Dave Mattacks on drums, plus button accordionist John Kirkpatrick. The band toured in Britain the following year.

Newly converted to Sufism, Thompson withdrew to the English countryside to start a Sufi community and returned to the business with ‘First Light’ in 1978. The album was a critical success but failed to earn much money.

Thomson’s first solo album ‘Henry the Human Fly’ in 1972 portrayed the real talent in him. Although the work was recognized not at the time of its release but many years later critics have now recognized its artistic value.