Rumor and Sigh

Richard Thompson’s seventh solo album is perhaps his most celebrated, and was nominated for a Grammy after it was released in 1991. The album did well in the UK, and the single “I Feel So Good” was a modest hit on American radio, but the album’s real highlights are two odes to romantic bewilderment (“I Misunderstood” and “You Dream Too Much”) and a despairing plea to a toxic ex-girlfriend (“Keep Your Distance”) — plus the utterly brilliant “1952 Vincent Black Lightning,” on which Thompson takes the motorcycle-rebel trope and creates a new and entirely English setting for it.