Hippies vs. Punks: Richard & Linda Thompson's "Light(s)" Albums, Pt. 3, Shoot Out the Lights

There is one run I have been doing for over 15 years now. I call it the "Big Man's Run" because it involves running for over an hour. When I was in my thirties I could complete it in one hour. Now, it takes me an hour and a quarter. The Big Man's Run (BMR) is a little under eight miles and takes me north out of my Capitol Hill neighborhood over the University Bridge and then onto the Burke-Gilman Trail until I get to Fremont; at which point I exit the trail, cross the Fremont Bridge and then head east down the hill to hook up with Westlake Avenue, more exactly, the miles of parking lot that rim Lake Union. I head south until I get to the South Lake Union Cascade neighborhood, which used to be a funky, bohemian low-rent district but is now dominated by new concrete architecture that anchors the Amazon commercial empire. Then I head east climbing hills and a freeway overpass until I am back in my Capitol Hill neighborhood.

On the BMR, right when I cross the University Bridge and am connecting with the Burke-Gilman Trail, there is a sculpture that incorporates the words "The Wall of Death." It is located, incongruously, beneath the north end of University Bridge where the Burke-Gilman Trail passes underneath. The Wall of Death was a once-popular carnival sideshow where stunt-riding motorcyclists ride around a circular wall climbing higher and higher as their centripetal force grows. (A variation of The Wall of Death opens the 2013 Derek Cianfrance film The Place Beyond the Pines.) The Wall of Death sculpture beneath the University Bridge might be so named because it is a popular spot for skateboarders attracted by the forty-five-degree angle concrete walls.

Whenever I run past the sculpture, which, as I said, I've been doing regularly for a long time, I can't help but think of the final track on Richard & Linda Thompson's break-up album, Shoot Out the Lights (1982).

Shoot Out the Lights is widely acknowledged as Richard & Linda Thompson's masterpiece. For instance, it comes in at number 332 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, significantly outpolling I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight (1974) which comes in at 471.

I prefer Bright Lights and First Light (1978) of the three great "Light(s)" albums of Richard & Linda Thompson. But thanks to the success of Shoot Out the Lights -- it was a critics choice album back in 1982 boosted by Robert Christgau's 'A' grade in The Village Voice -- it established Richard Thompson on a long, productive solo career that is still going strong, and it sparked a much-deserved reappraisal of the couple's previous recordings.

Recorded quickly in the summer of 1981 while Linda was pregnant, Shoot Out the Lights was produced by Joe Boyd (the guy responsible for discovering and recording Fairport Convention back in the 1960s) for his small Hannibal Records label. Richard & Linda Thompson had been dropped by Chrysalis because of the poor sales of Sunnyvista (1979). By the time Shoot Out the Lights is released in March 1982, the Thompson's marriage had collapsed.

An earlier version of the album exists in bootleg form. Recorded by Gerry Rafferty (lead guitarist of Stealers Wheel and co-writer of "Stuck in the Middle with You," the pop tune memorialized in Reservoir Dogs) in September and October of 1980 and unsuccessfully shopped to record labels, it is a slicker studio album; some of its tracks can be found online under the heading "Rafferty's Folly," like this version of "Don't Renege on Our Love":

For me, my memories of Shoot Out the Lights always begin with the first side of the album, particularly the first three cuts: "Don't Renege on Our Love," "Walking on a Wire," and "Man in Need." These songs are a point-counterpoint of an aggrieved wife and husband. I would listen to this album before heading off to work a second-shift job on the 99th floor of the World Trade Center. My own marriage was collapsing that sunny spring. I believe, looking back now, that Shoot Out the Lights provided excellent counsel: