The Return of Scott Walker

So Deb from the deli downstairs from WFMU today hit me with "when's this Scott Walker album coming out already? It's been ten years since that guy put out Tilt." I admitted that I was excited too, Tilt was one of the most esoteric, uncategorizable and downright brilliant records of the decade, I mean I still haven't completely wrapped my head around it after a hundred listens, both lyrically and musically. She agreed, citing Robert Nedelkoff's dissection of Walker (known to his mam once as Noel Scott Engel) in the Nestful of Ninnies zine where he was citing all these supposed Ricky Ricardo references in the opaque lyrics on Tilt, tying them in with Cuban revolution and all these other disparate things floating around in the bizarro mix of Gregorian chants, crushing industrial-metal rhythms, and mutated, frozen techno. It's rare that you can find someone this committed and serious, a true artist divorced from the trappings of the music biz like Walker that works at his own pace regardless of what the public (or labels) demands, so when he pokes his head above ground it's a real reason to drop what you're doing and take notice. "That guy is on crack," Deb simply said, then she tore me a new one for paying for my food with a twenty dollar bill when she had no change. Even after I offered the info that Mr. W's new record The Drift is hitting the streets via 4AD Records on May 8th! Sheesh. You really gotta walk on eggshells in that place. They never quite forgave me for that time I tripped and dumped my Broccoli Rabe all over Mayor Bloomberg while he was there.

So yes, Scott Walker is a genuine hero in these hallways, and once he even called WFMU's office line to thank us for playing him over the years and talk about sending some LP's; when Kelly Jones tried to keep him on the line to go rouse someone to talk with him he got a bit nervous and said "I don't do interviews!" and quickly disappeared as quickly as he called. No, he sure doesn't, which is why we're posting this segment from BBC's Culture Show this past Thursday (19.3 MB wmv file for download, Mac users should instead just stream the clip on You Tube.) It's his first public TV sitdown in over a decade, actually doing promo for the new album.  There's also some previewing of 30th Century Man, a bonafide documentary on Scott directed by Stephen Kijak due out later this year featuring testimonial gushings from the likes of Bowie, Eno, members of Radiohead and others while tracing his whole saga. The BBC show previews a clip or two, and I must say, you gotta love the shot where they're slapping a slab of bacon for percussion in the studio during the making of the new record.

While he insists he is not a recluse, Walker has certainly shown all the trademarks of being a bona-fide enigma. Discovered in the 60's by Eddie Fisher, he formed the Walker Brothers and moved to England where the group stirred up Beatles-style hysteria and huge hits. The rigors of touring ended the group after a visit to Japan and sent Scott off on his own despite the pop success of his past (and even hosting a TV show called Scott); his solo albums to follow in the 70's were dark, moody and strange affairs that were inspired by European cabaret, Camus, Bartok modality and Sartre among other things. While this string of LPs (titled 1, 2, 3, and 4 ) were lofty and ambitious, they also were commercial flops, but revered today by those who understand the true inner struggles he faced and continues to face. The 80's saw sporadic activity, a Julian Cope compilation primer of him with some extensive writings though the years, and while he was not around in the public eye, 1995's Tilt showed that he was indeed paying attention to what was going on in music, taking certain innovative elements and easily bending them around his unique voice and stark, apocalyptic arrangements. But on that album he also invented things that could only have been created by him; he had already turned away work for him by leading moodsetters like Eno and Sylvian (calling the former "clinical" and the latter "someone who has accepted his connection to spirituality while I still struggle"). Press was divided on the results; accusations of a career of deliberate obscurism flew (though the 80s' Climate of Hunter featured none other than Billy Ocean and Mark Knopfler, how pop can one get?), while others painted him to be as important an artist as Sinatra in terms of projection of a singular personal vision. Scott did become a bit more public though in recent years; he curated an All Tomorrow's Parties event in the UK (did not perform), did some music for the film Pola X, but again, for the most part has been quite absent from the spotlight. Til now. Word has it that this one trumps Tilt, so absence can indeed be a very good thing when the end quality is near perfect. Live shows stateside may be too much to ask, but who knows? All in all, not a bad story for a man that Christgau once called "Anthony Newley without the voice muscles" and "a male Vera Lynn for late-bloomers who found Paul McCartney too R&B". In terms of longevity, Mr. Engel may just have the ace card.

Comments

[Cookie]

I'm pretty sure Julian Cope never wrote a book about Scott Walker. I'm a pretty gig fan of both of those guys and I think i would have heard about it.

[Guest]

I don't think Brian meant Cope had published a book ("primer") but a compilation - Fire Escape in the Sky (aka the Godlike Genius of Scott Walker). I'm sure he's written or commented about Scott extensively, as on his website in this review:

Climate of the Hunter

[Cookie]

He changed it after my comment-
It originally said a biography by Julian Cope or something to that effect

[Taro, in Tokyo]

So....Where are the WFMU streams of Scott Walker over the years?

I hardly can remember Walker Brothers' tunes from the 60s and he ain't got any airtime or mention on WFMU (according to the "search" function).

Damn, now I am curious.

His new stuff on 4ad.com makes me wonder what the real stuff back in the 60s was like/
http://www.4ad.com/releases/the-drift/

[Chris]

I want to know what George Bush is doing about the Epstein-Barr Virus

[Listener_zero]

Taro: http://wfmu.org/artistbrowser.php?action=artist&artist=Scott+Walker&artist_id=81

[Listener Howard]

That 4AD link seems to be mutating the new Scott release with old Pixies rehash... Hopefully the real page will go live soon...

And I cannot remember the last time I was looking forward to an album so much!

[Peak Lupe]

Scott Walker never curated All Tomorrow's Parties, he curated the Meltdown festival in 2000 at the South Bank in London.
The Drift is amazing, by the way, I haven't listened to anything else for three weeks.

[Baz]

Yippee! A new Scott album at last! I was one of the diehards who bought "Tilt" on the day of release and I'll be buying "The Drift" on the day too.

Lovelovelove this guy. A true original, "Tilt" still sounds wondrous and weird today. Interestingly, Tilt even charted getting into the British Top 40 albums for a short period which was both remarkable for such an album and proof that Scott is still highly revered here in Britain. Though Scott is American, he has lived in London for most of his life, so for me hes an honorary Brit.

On Bedazzled you can find a vintage clip of Scott performing "Jackie" - its a bit washed out but its thrilling stuff! What he was doing in the late 60s was extraordinary with all the Brel covers and Scotts own remarkable compositions. Its amusing he explains why Scott 3 killed his career in many ways and hes right - how many albums are there where everything is in 3/4 or 6/8? As 1970 came and went, he flushed it all down the pan by resorting to dodgy albums of covers or worse, Country music (Stretch and Did We Have It All are awful!) and then came the strange reunion with the Walker Brothers. It is on their last album on "The Electrician" that we suddenly saw the true Scott again giving a taster of what was ultimately to come in "Climate of Hunter" and "Tilt".

This new documentary promises to be fascinating... I'm very surprised that Scott agreed to it and for obsessives like me, it will be essential. I also notice that his old label are releasing a 5 CD boxset in June featuring everything the Walker Brothers ever did, so its obvious "The Drift" is eagerly anticipated. I know for certain it will be much more interesting than the fiasco that was Kate Bush' Aerial which was a huge let down.

Roll on May!
BAZ

[Station Manager Ken]

Taro - Scott Walker has received lots of airplay on WFMU over the years. Click here for the search results.

Cookie - Brian was having typepad problems when this was posted and then he is inexplicably blocked from commenting (probably cause his IP number resembles the 500 or so spammers that I've had to block). But he asked me to post this:

Cookie, sorry, I was actually in the process of re-editng the whole damn article because it was posted prematurely while I was in draft mode. Then for some reason I couldn't post the comment, I had to just change the text without commenting. What can I say, people are fast when it comes to blog commenting I guess.

[Jonny]

I don't think it's true to say that the Scott 1-4 albums were 'commercial flops'. The BBC interview implied this too, but my recollection is that with the exception of 'Scott 4', they all went to number 1 or thereabouts in the UK. I was always amazed to think that an album like 'Scott 2' could have got to number 1, but apparently it did!

[Baz]

To comemmorate Scotts return I have just done a little feature on him on my Blog, Sonic Pollutions at http://sonicpollutions.blogspot.com/

Since I haven't seen it in circulation yet on the net, I have unearthed what is to date, Scotts' last live performance which was on British TV in June 1995 performing "Rosary" from "Tilt"! You know you wanna see it, so please pop along and download it! It should whet your appetite further for the new album!
All The Best,
BAZ

[Lennon Saviour of England]

I think I should point out that the "Moviegoer" was actually an excellent and classy album. As were his versions of Sundown, The House Song and It's Over.

[sct]

For future reference, Mac users don't have to download the Windows Media Player to play WMVs. This plug-in (Flip4Mac) will allow your OS X Quicktime player to play WMV files directly in the player.

[Lukas]

Oh my god, I just got the album, and it is true, it is better than the already fantastic Tilt. What a genius!

[Adrian]

Not that I want to be pedantic or anything (OK I do), but he curated London's Royal Festival Hall's Meltdown festival, not an ATP event. Other luminaries to have curated the event (which is basically them programming film, music and art dos) include Laurie Anderson, Nick Cave and Patti Smith. Walker also produced the final Pulp album, We Love Life.

Hmm, wonder if his Britvic TV ad is on YouTube…

[Marnye]

I just want to add that indeed his first 3 solo albums (Scott, Scott 2 and Scott 3) were not flops in England, they all were top-5 albums. It's Scott 4 which inexplicably failed to sell and was the beginning of the end for him, with no support from record companies and his managers. He signed with CBS, home of Dylan and Leonard Cohen, hoping they would be interested in his singing his own songs, but they made him sing covers. He was always going on about integrity but he sure compromised a lot after "Scott 4", even allowing a manager to get co-songwriter credits.
It's good to see he is still around and being creative. But on the whole he comes across as rock's Montgomery Clift, he let his neuroses, personal problems, insecurities overcome his career.