Billy Thompson Interview with Riveting Riffs Magazine

Interview by Joe Montague

A Better Man seems like an apt description of Blues guitarist and singer – songwriter Billy Thompson and it is also the title of his current album, an album that is being played on radio stations worldwide and has in particular garnered favorable radio airplay in the northeast United States. The former army brat who grew up in Fort Polk, Louisiana, prior to his parents moving to New Mexico and eventually as an adult he made his home in San Diego, has served up his best album to date. In creating what has turned into a spell binding, note bending and virtuosic guitar performance, Billy Thompson collaborated with drummer and producer Tony Braunagel, who has played and recorded with Eric Burdon, Rickie Lee Jones, Bette Midler, Bonnie Raitt and Taj Mahal, and enlisted the services of Grammy Award winning sound engineer and producer Ed Cherney, who mixed A Better Man. Thompson who has also played with an impressive lineup of artists including, Little Milton, Albert King, Art Neville, Chuck Berry and Elvin Bishop, assembled his own cast of impressive musicians to back him on this album, including, guitarist Johnny Lee Schell (Bonnie Raitt, Renne Geyer), keyboardist Mike Finnigan (Etta James, Crosby Stills and Nash, Peter Frampton, Rod Stewart, Tracy Chapman and Buddy Guy), guitarist Kenny Gradney (Little Feat, Carly Simon, Delaney and Bonnie, Robert Palmer, Warren Zevon), bassist James “Hutch” Hutchinson (Professor Longhair, James Booker, Garth Brooks, Elton John, Kathy Mattea, Tanya Tucker, Pattie La Belle, Bryan Adams, Stevie Nicks) and of course Tony Braunagel on drums.

It was while his parents were moving about the country when Billy Thompson was growing up that music first started to shape his life, as he listened to R&B, Pop and Rock n Roll music on the 50,000 watt radio station KOMA out of Oklahoma City. He also listened to Wolfman Jack broadcasting on XERB out of Del Rio, Texas.

“I started playing the harmonica at age 18, but nobody ever pushed me towards lessons or anything,” he says, while admitting it took a long time before he felt comfortable playing in front of an audience. “I was pretty shy. I knew I could sing. With my first band we did Steve Miller tunes and I don’t know what all and probably a few Neil Young, “Down By The River,” because it was that era. It was more of a rock approach than it was a Blues approach, but eventually I started playing Blues. I put the harmonica down and I started playing the guitar at about age 19. Country Rock was kind of happening, so I thought I should learn some of that. Eventually, I discovered that I was not really happy doing that. I am happy finding my voice within the Blues based approach. It was 1987 is when I really started taking a strictly Blues based approach.”

Talking about his current album A Better Man, Thompson says, “This is a collection of songs that I had written along the way and one of the things that I have been trying not to do is focus on (things such as) my baby left me and fill in the blank. My girlfriend Kirsten Trump co-wrote five of the tunes. I write the music and the melody for whatever lyrics she writes. I have a few that I am chipping away at right now. She will have an idea and she will say that she would like it to be like a slow Blues and maybe minor sounding and then I will fool with it. I kind of beat (the songs) into shape and it takes a while, because they aren’t coming from me. I feel that I am good at that.”

Billy Thompson also collaborated with another highly regarded singer - songwriter, Sue Leonard (KD. Lang, Bon Jovi) for the song “Are You Ready?” which appears on the current album. “She had the idea, the melody and the hook (he sings Are You Ready?) and I wrote pretty well everything else. We have written a couple of songs that are pretty cool. We have another one that I would really like to record next time around. The idea that Sue had with “Are You Ready?” was (from the woman’s perspective) of someone coming over and laying her down. If you listen to Clapton you will never hear a tune that is that suggestive and I guess I’ve come out of that whole mold, but I have received great responses (from people) since doing that tune. I am sure that it would sound good, doing it as a duet with Sue or having Sue do a duet on her own. She is a great gal, a great singer and she is a real character.”

Including his Remixed and Remastered compilation album, A Better Man is Billy Thompson’s fifth solo effort. He debuted with Coat of Many Colors, which he describes as taking more of a Stax Records approach, with his music reflecting the feel of artists such as Sam and Dave and Eddie Floyd. Tangerine Sky followed next and he began to move away from the Staxx and Memphis feel with his music and his music took on more of a New Orleans vibe to it. The third album, Area 51 got its name when he was traveling with two other musicians and two of them saw what he describes as a light that zipped across the mountain top. The music on Area 51 was influenced by a meeting between Billy Thompson and Sonny Landreth, during which Thompson asked Landreth to teach him how to play behind the bar slide. Remixed and Remastered was simply a compilation of the first three albums.

Billy Thompson is also a much sought after Blues guitarist and music supervisor for theatrical productions, an aspect of his career that began in San Diego during 1999 with the production Thunder Knocking On The Door, which featured music by Keb Mo, and he later made the trip to New York City with the same musical. Thunder Knocking At The Door also marked the first time that Thompson worked with Tony Award winning playwright Keith Glover. In 2004 he once again worked with Keith Glover, this time on Rose of Corazon. Thompson was asked to co-write the music and to act as the music supervisor for the production. Other highlights have included an appearance with Ain’t Nothin’ But The Blues, which was performed at the John F. Kennedy Centre for the Performing Arts. His decision to relocate to West Virginia, was partially influenced by the opportunity to do some work with the Contemporary American Theatre Festival.

“(The theatre experience) has been good for me, because I don’t really read or write music, so I am able to have a musical director put the music into Finale and print out charts and do all of the things that I would have to hire someone to do. It has been an interesting experience,” he says.

Billy Thompson may be A Better Man, but Blues music fans everywhere are better off when he keeps creating songs like those that populate his current album. You can listen to select tracks from Billy Thompson’s A Better Man by visiting his Reverbnation website.

On September 14^th, Billy Thompson will perform at Sweet Caroline’s in Winchester, Virginia, October 1^st at the Washington Grove Festival at Washington Grove, Virginia and on October 18^th he will be back in San Diego with concert details still to be announced. You can check his website for more concert dates this fall.