Though I've heard of Fairport Convention, I'd never really heard much of Richard Thompson's music before. He occasionally gets played on KFOG's "Accoustic Sunrise", and that's about it. Since finding his latest album on the late lamented EMusic, though, I've been listening to "The Old Kit Bag" over and over and over. Good album, and I'm also (perhaps unfairly) always impressed when somebody who's been making music for the better part of four decades still sounds fresh and inspired.
I was also very interested to learn today that he's a practicing Sufi Muslim! According to this site, he introduces one of the songs on his album, "Outside of the Inside" as "a song about how the Taliban see the West". I don't completely buy that, though — the song hits much closer to home, with its lyrics denouncing various great thinkers of the West. I mean, who seems the most anti-science and culture, lately? If you answered the American religious right, you get a cookie! I suppose that's what makes it a great song though... it could be about any fanatic, anywhere. And it shure sounds purty, too...
