Linda Thompson - Versatile Heart

Can't Stop Listening

I have to confess I love Linda Thompson's voice and her music. As a personality, she has considerable charm.
This music is versatile in style and every other way. Good writing and good musicians add to the allure. The list of songs I love is so inclusive I won't type them all. June 23, 2008

Linda Thompson - Versatile Heart

Very enjoyable, reminds why she was part of such a well known duo for so long. This is not a whispery, ghost voice from the 60's but is right up there with anyone else doing this music today. And this music remains timely; contexts change, but these songs and this performance are going to continue to stand the test of time. Note that many of these songs were written or co-written by Teddy Thompson, Linda Thompson's son. Teddy now seems to have achieved some wider independent solo success with his recent "Up Front and Low Down" CD. January 20, 2008

She's just so good!

I am a longtime fan of Linda Thompson, and was really looking forward to this new collection of songs. The more I play this CD, the more I love it. Standouts for me are Nice Cars, Day After Tomorrow, Versatile Heart, and Katy Cruel. Really, though, it's just an exceptional piece of work. Kudos to Teddy Thompson for being the perfect collaborator with his mother (he's a great singer/songwriter/musician in his own right). Linda is someone I think I'd love to know in real life, and I hope she keeps making wonderful music. November 26, 2007

nice grown up english folk

nice grown up english folkmusic. not her best but good quality and some high level songs November 15, 2007

versatile linda

"Versatile Heart" is Linda Thompson's very worthy follow-up to her "comeback album" of five years ago, "Fashionably Late." For the most part, it follows the pattern established by that album, but it is a bit more relaxed in feel and shows more of Linda's range as a vocalist/performer.

A few of the songs, including the upbeat title track, consciously invoke the style of Linda's first collaboration with her ex-husband Richard, the classic "I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight". That early album established Linda as a first-rate interpreter of "dramatic" song material, and "Versatile Heart" shows that Linda is still doing these types of dry and pristine takes on traditional English folk music better than anyone with the possible exception of June Tabor. The best example of this on the album is Rufus Wainright's lovely "Beauty", similar in feel (and title) to "Paint and Powder Beauty" from "Fashionably Late".

"Beauty", pretty sounding as it is, also contains what I believe is the only significant flaw in this album--a clumsy, warbling counterharmony sung by Antony, of Antony and the Johnsons. Linda and Antony's vocals don't mesh very well, and they each seem to be consciously trying to get out of each other's way. It's as if she was dueting with Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead--an interesting, but unsuccessful experiment, and the only drawback to a most enjoyable album.

September 28, 2007

More reviews at Amazon.com ...