I’m a huge fan of the 33 1/3 book series. Right now I’m reading Hayden Childs’ take on the Richard and Linda Thompson classic Shoot Out the Lights.
This is an important album for me. First of all, Z introduced me to it. I spent a lot of time in 4D singing “Walking on a Wire” with McParty and Ali and it helped me through a supertough time.
For his meditation on the album, Childs defers to the narrator Virgil, a sad sack who sees a lot of himself in Richard Thompson and a bit of his ex in Linda Thompson. Trapped in a car for a Florida-to-New York road trip, he turns on the tape and looks at the album through the lens of the Thompsons’ dissolving marriage, and his own.
For a while, I’d been thinking about proposing a 33 1/3 tome of my own. I toyed with a bunch of ideas and spent the most time thinking about Krautrockers Can, trying to decide between the albums Monster Movie with Malcolm Mooney and Tago Mago and Ege Bamyasi with Damo Suzuki. Nothing felt right. Then it hit me like a bolt of lightning and my decision was easy. Even then I didn’t know what direction to take, until I got a few pages into Shoot out the Lights. Again with the lightning.
Last night, I submitted my proposal. Today, they (briefly) mentioned it on their blog. Guess which one!
Richard and Linda Thompson, FYT
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