Proxy Music

With a cover aping Roxy Music’s debut album, Linda Thompson launches her proxy project – with family and friends including Rufus and Martha Wainwright and Eliza Carthy singing this set of new songs that, because of spasmodic dysphonia, she cannot sing herself. Her songwriting mojo may have been dormant since 2013’s Won’t Be Long Now, but this set shows her to be as witty, emotive and succinct as ever. Daughter Kami voices ‘The Solitary Traveller’ while Ren Harvieu delivers the darkly humorous ‘I Used to be so Pretty’, a song with good cheekbones and sharp rhymes. John Grant sings ‘John Grant’, while the acoustic guitar and voices of The Rails make ‘Mudlark’ sound like 1970s folk rock. Banjo and fiddle come to ‘Shores of America’ and The Unthanks voice ‘Three Shaky Ships’, co-written with Linda’s ex, Richard. While we miss her voice, it’s great to have her back.