Charles Michael Kittridge Thompson IV (born April 6, 1965), known professionally as Black Francis and formerly Frank Black, is an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist who is the lead vocalist of the alternative rock band Pixies. Following the band's breakup in 1993, he embarked on a solo career releasing fifteen albums and forming his band, the Catholics. The Pixies regrouped in 2004, and he declared his solo career to be over in 2013.

His vocal style varies from a screaming, yowling delivery with Pixies to a more measured, melodic style in his solo career. His cryptic lyrics mostly explore unconventional subjects, such as surrealism, UFOs, and biblical violence, along with science fiction and surf culture. His use of atypical meter signatures, loud–quiet dynamics, and distinct preference for live-to-two-track recording during his time with the Catholics have given him a distinct style within alternative rock.

Charles Michael Kittridge Thompson IV was born in Boston, Massachusetts. His father was a bar owner. Thompson lived in Los Angeles, California, because his father wanted to "learn more about the restaurant and bar business". Thompson's parents introduced him to 1960s folk rock at a young age. His first guitar was his mother's, a Yamaha classical guitar bought with money from his father's bar tips, which he started to play at age "11 or 12".

Thompson's family moved around, first with his father, and then his stepfather, a religious man who "pursued real estate on both coasts"; his parents had separated twice by the time he was in first grade. When Thompson was 12, his mother and stepfather joined an evangelical church that was tied to the Pentecostal denomination Assemblies of God, a move that influenced many of his songs written with the Pixies, which often refer to the Bible.

He discovered the music of Christian rock singer-songwriter Larry Norman at 13 when Norman played at a religious summer camp that Thompson attended. Norman's music influenced Thompson to the extent that he titled the Pixies' first EP and a lyric in the band's song "Levitate Me" after one of Norman's catchphrases, "Come on, pilgrim!" Thompson later described the music he listened to during his youth:

I used to hang out with some misfits. [...] We were the 'we listen to odd-ball music' kids. I wasn't hanging out at all-ages shows or trying to get into clubs to see bands, and I was buying records at used records stores and borrowing them from the library. You just saw Emerson, Lake & Palmer records. So I didn't know [punk] music but I started to hear about it in high school. But it was probably a good thing that I didn't know it, that I instead listened to a lot of '60s records and this religious music.

Thompson lived in an apartment in Marblehead, Massachusetts. Just before his senior year, his family moved to Westport, Massachusetts, where he received a Teenager of the Year award—the title of a later solo album. During this time, Thompson composed several songs that appeared in his later career, including "Here Comes Your Man" from Doolittle, and "Velvety Instrumental Version".

After graduating from Westport High School in 1983, Thompson studied at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, majoring in anthropology. Thompson shared a room with another roommate for a semester before moving in with future Pixies guitarist Joey Santiago. The two shared an interest in rock music, and Santiago introduced Thompson to 1970s punk and the music of David Bowie; they began to jam together. It was at this time that Thompson discovered The Cars, a band he described as "very influential on me and the Pixies".