Decades into his career, Richard Thompson remains a perennial critical favorite, favorite of other musicians, and cult hero; his guitar work (hybrid picking, bizarre tuning, and soloing that never feels too self-indulgent) is unparalleled and his songwriting taut, brainy, dry and dark. Still is no departure for Thompson—it's a solid, stark record, expanding on and refining themes that wend their way through his significant oeuvre. But it brings a further depth and resonance to territory that will be familiar to longtime fans, and it's vivid enough to serve as an entry point for those new to his work. For a veteran like Thompson, it's hard to ask for more than that.
Recorded with Wilco's Jeff Tweedy at his Loft Studio in Chicago—Tweedy also contributes backing guitar and vocals on some tracks—Still feels extremely present and immediate. There's no studio frosting; it's like listening to Thompson and his band perform directly in front of you with no other noise or distractions. (Considering the many overwrought production missteps of the Mitchell Froom years of his career, roughly 1986-1996, Thompson has no doubt learned that spare production allows the unique beauty of his guitar work, solos that thread through the songs like copper wire, and the quality of his songwriting to shine.) The folk backbone that Thompson has carried from his initial background with Fairport Convention is still strong and evident on tracks like "She Never Could Resist a Winding Road", and he plays musically with the historical connections between British folk, Appalachian folk, and the blues on "Patty Don't You Put Me Down".
The characters in Thompson's songwriting are always struggling, never satisfied. They squabble, they leave, they ache, they are hollow, they frustrate one another, and they are unbelievably cruel to one another. This makes the occasional moment of tenderness and empathy, when written with honesty, seem less maudlin or manipulative than genuine. "No Peace, No End" is ferocious, all teeth and claws. Much in the tradition of "Al Bowlly's in Heaven" and "Gethsemane", two personal-political classics from Thompson's oeuvre, it's about the scars of war on both the soldier and the world around him. "Broken Doll" uses the incredibly heavy-handed imagery of a doll that can't be mended to describe a woman who has endured unnamed and unspeakable trauma, but as Thompson's male protagonist struggles to love a woman who hurts immensely because she deserves it and does not ask any reward for himself for doing so—material that in less deft hands would cause immediate and permanent eyerolling—he finds a bloody sincerity that makes the song stark, real, and kind.
The gender dynamics of Thompson's songs can arch toward the uncomfortable territory of Troubled Women Toying With Men, or Troubled Women As Romantic And Uncomplicated Objects, but his male protagonists are always presented as just as flawed as his females, and there's always an air of deep self-deprecation. In "All Buttoned Up", a woman refuses to fuck her male partner for reasons unknown, and he's incredibly pissed off about it, but he stays with her —because she's really great otherwise, and he cares about her.
The biggest weak spot on Still is his throwaway goofball song—in the tradition of "Two Left Feet", "My Daddy Is a Mummy", and other such live crowd-pleasers, it's a song about a pirate with the misfortune to actually be named "Long John Silver". "Beatnik Walking", in which Thompson pokes gentle fun at himself and his loyal fanbase (grown-up original hippies and jazz fanatics), is much lighter and more enjoyable, as is "Guitar Heroes", an ode to the artists who shaped Thompson's style and to the love of the instrument itself. One clunker on an album full of gems doesn't drag everything else down, though, and Thompson deserves all our respect—he's been through the major-label wringer, found his place where he can be celebrated as he deserves among his independent fans, and is still making complicated, thoughtful, intricate, resonant music on his own terms many decades deep into his career.
