I love music of many genres, rock, blues, red dirt, old school country, americana, reggae, even some rap, hiphop and pop. And I have some fairly strong opinions on what I don't like - misogenistic music of any genre, bro-country in general, and autotune anything. If I had to pick a favorite genre, it's Americana and more the traditional singer-songwriter acoustic flavor. And there's that one song - Richard Thompson's 1952 Vincent Black Lightning - that stands above them all for me.
The central character in the song is the holy grail of motorcycles - a 1952 Vincent Black Lightning. Only 31 of these bikes were produced, and only 19 are known to survive today. The last one to appear at auction in 2018 sold for 929,000 - a record for motorcycles. The Vincent Black Lightning was [in 1950] the fastest production motorcycle in the world as well, setting a land speed record at Bonnevile Salt Flats of 156mph in 1950. Rare even in its day, this would have been a motorcycle to treasure - and in the mind of James, worth stealing to acquire.
One of my favorite literary comments is that the 'author paints with words'. I assign this happily to writers like Barbara Kingsolver and Larry McMurtry, and to songwriters like Larry's son James McMurtry, Ian Tyson, Joni Mitchell, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Tupac, Guy Clark, Hayes Carll, and Robert Earl Keen among others. And Richard Thompson. From his days in Fairport Convention and all through the years as a solo artist, he's been a masterful singer, an incredible guitarist, and one heck of a painter with word and melody. If you can listen to this song and not be transported to a working class neighborhood in England in the rebellious 1960s, I'm not sure there's much hope for your musical soul :)
If you aren't familiar with the song, it's the story with all the elements of a 15th century ballad - a rouguish highwayman in love with a beautiful town girl, ill-gotten gains, fast horses, swords, a lawman, gore, death and heaven. Oh wait... how about a bad boy, a girl, a motorcycle, guns, a lawman, gore, death and heaven. And sung in the traditional style of any good Scots/Irish/English ballad. The difference is that Thompson is in the here and now, writing about contemporary (60s) characters in a typical English town, as he does on many occasions. This could've been set in the American "Wild West'' with a stagecoach robber, the rancher's daughter, a favored stallion, in Feudal Japan, Mexico, Spain - almost anywhere.
The song is rich with allusion to the motorcycle culture of England in the 1960s, leather jackets, pubs, and of course pretty girls. Imbedded in the last verse of the song are references to several other British bikes of the era - Triumph, Norton, Greeves, and in the final stanza the Ariel. He often changes the mix in live performances to include other bikes. I won't delve too deeply into the lyrics beyond that - American Songwriter has a good article about the song and the lyrics.
The original!
What I *did* want to mention are a couple of noteworth covers. The first is by Del McCoury - a high tenor bluegrass singer with a great band backing him. Del tweaked the words a little, placing it in Tennessee, and it's given a bit of bluegrass treatment - like son Ronnie's mandolin break.
The other is Reckless Kelly's amazing cover from Cain's Ballroom, video by Red Dirt Nation. Aside from being an incredible cover, the intro by David Abeyta is something very special. While paying homage to the original, it stands on its own building tension in the room before turning the song over to Willy Braun's vocals. There are other covers, but to me this stands as the standard against which others should be judged. Reckless Kelly has used this as their closing or encore song for years, and while I've heard it in the middle of the show lately, it's still amazing.
