Description
This is a pre-order. It will ship on or around 10/16/26
Sixty years into a career that began with Fairport Convention and has spanned decades as one of rock's most acclaimed singer-songwriters, Richard Thompson is still chasing surprise. On Hippies, Thugs and Heroes, he lets his subconscious take the wheel, pulling from a cast of old friends, false gurus, former selves, and invented characters who insisted on having their stories told.
The result is an album that refuses to sit still. It opens with the bright, Byrds-inspired jangle of "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" — a song rooted in Thompson's own history with 1970s spiritual movements and the complicated pull of charismatic leaders — before swinging into the rowdy "Everybody's Stealing" and landing on the bluesy closer "Stringer." Along the way, "Cocaine Walking, Booze Talking" delivers some of his most inventive guitar work yet, a raw-nerve build into a splintered, psychedelic solo that captures a hardscrabble cast of London strivers and connivers.
Recorded live with his longtime band — Taras Prodaniuk on bass, Michael Jerome on drums, David Mansfield on guitar and fiddle, and wife Zara Phillips on backing vocals — at Hobosound Studio in Weehawken, NJ, the sessions moved fast, often in just two to four takes. But the songwriting itself runs deep: more elaborate home demos gave Thompson's own musical identity a stronger hold on the final record, resulting in an album he describes as "less them and more me."
What emerges is a spiritual inquiry disguised as a rock record — a meditation on the towers we build and the ruin that follows when we invest in them too completely. Thompson doesn't fully understand every song here, and that's exactly the point. Hippies, Thugs and Heroes is proof that after sixty years, the joy of not knowing where a song will take you hasn't faded one bit.
Q: How do limited edition and exclusive releases work?
Limited and exclusive items are fulfilled in the order received and may be subject to availability. If we’re unable to fulfill your order, you’ll receive a full refund.
Q: When will my pre-order ship?
Pre-orders ship on or around the official release date. If your order includes both pre-order and in-stock items, everything will ship together once all items are available. All orders are charged at the time of purchase.
