Scott Walker. (RIP March 2019)

Speaking of Bond themes and '67, the Walker Brothers did record the theme song for "Deadlier Than The Male" kind of a 007 knock-off (Bulldog Drummond being the Bond-like hero):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6HSbanREbE

"It's kind of "jump scare," but the moment where the percussion comes in on "The Cockfighter" always sets me off even when I'm anticipating it. That atmosphere is so cold!"

One track on The Drift is very quiet, and then Donald Duck makes a guest appearance. It's the only time an album has made me jump. I can't remember which track because it's one of those albums I listen to in a single go. I'll look it up on the internet.

It's called The Escape, that's what it's called.

On a more serious note, The Guardian's obit repeats the old factoid about Climate of Hunter being the lowest-selling record on Virgin Records. Is that true? It sounds implausible. It got to number sixty and only spent two weeks on the chart, but even accounting for "the long tail" I can't imagine the likes of Chili Charles' 1973 folk-rock obscurity Busy Corner or Comus' second album - from Virgin's early prog period - selling more copies. It had a widespread international release. Also, I'm going to look at Discogs.com and see if people have started selling the LP version of The Drift for £700 yet.

that was brought up somewhere else here recently. the album got released in multiple countries and was reissued not long after the initial release so i doubt it was virgin's lowest-selling record.

Xposts

Lullaby was a bonus track only on the Japanese edition of the Lemper CD.

It and Scope J were also both included on the Five Easy Pieces box set

RIP

Five Easy Pieces does a surprisingly great job of summing up Scott before The Drift with its themed CDs, and it picks up a lot of stray tracks. I believe it makes the Pola X soundtrack redundant for Scott completists, too (ditto for the four Scott tracks from Nite Flights, though I listen to that album whole sometimes anyway).

It's the "This Is How You Disappear" disc of the FEP box I've decided to go for this evening.

I wish I still had that set ☹️

RIP, obv not much to add other than I love his music, especially the later records.

I laughed all over again this morning at those pictures of him with Sunn, there is nothing about his outfit or demeanor that would make you think he was anything other than some weird drone metal dude, he just looks like he's in Sunn

wasn't sure if I wanted to talk about this…but…I co-wrote the notes to the first release of any of his music in the U.S. since the 60s: I think Scott I was released stateside in 67 but none of the others were at the time. it's a compilation of his beloved 60s material. I didn't know anything about him until a few years beforehand…but I was gung ho, eager for discerning americans to appreciate this unique artist from Ohio who had taken off to Europe for an ascetic Ingmar Bergman existence, never to look back.

It made next to no impression, and any significant impression as such was negative. Xgau panned it, and it was clear to me that the Scott I-Scott IV shit was repulsive to his generation of critics and listeners, being that the context in which that music was created was light entertainment, Jack Jones, Englebert Humperdinck, the kind of shit that Xgau and his peers would consider to be what right on rock and roll was supposed to demolish, or at least oppose. The way he sang drove Xgau's cohort crazy and they couldn't get past it. And the Other music/WFMU people who were my peers didn't bite then; that would take place in the 00s, when I suspect many of you guys discovered him.

Yet the 60s shit is what the likes of Jarvis and Marc Almond et al repped for in 30th Century Man: I think neither one of those guys likes the Tilt'/Drift era at all.

the compilation was released in 1996.

The Razor and Tie compilation, yes? I deeply appreciated that release, it was what fully opened the door for me to understand his work after referrals from friends and mentions/covers from other artists. I thank you for it.

Honestly I never understood the Marc/Jarvis/etc revulsion or at least looking askance at the later work. It's on a very obvious throughline, as obvious as Mark Hollis's in a more compact sense.

Cope went off him too

Weird memory I have is of a Canadian friend I had just before the turn of the century who was a real music nut but to my shock had never heard of Scott Walker. I guess everyone has their blindspots but it made me think maybe there really was a big Atlantic divide still going on with him.

Looking at the NYT homepage now and no mention of him, so yeah.

Not where I grew up but generally, yes.

Have a different memory of the impact of that Razor and Tie comp -- it was all over WZBC at the time and that heavy airplay was my introduction to him.

i had already found an import of the Boy Child CD by the time the razor & tie comp came along but I agree it was a heroic shot [with a great booklet ;)]

Seems really rare in this day and age for a cultural figure to have a death that is breaking news on the BBC page yet registers nothing on the NYT page. And vice versa.

I think j cocker likes post-tilt stuff? He performed a song from the drift at that concert and he is the person who came up with the description “blocks of sound” that Walker always used to describe his approach

that's a nice suit

that's a swanky suit

Ha that’s gwb right?

I think it was Jarvis who guest-reviewed Tilt for Select at the time, and gave it something like "10 stars...or 2 stars...who really knows?!"

Ha that’s gwb right?

― A funny tinge happened on the way to the forum (wins), Monday, March 25, 2019 12:59 PM (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i don't know, it's the first thing that comes to mind when i think of scott walker for some reason. i (think i ) know that another lyrics in cossacks are is gwb "I'm looking for a good cowboy"

Yeah iirc both of those are things that gwb said to blair

When the shit Scott Walker got into power, I was talking to a couple of Wisconsinites about it and though they were both into music they had never heard of the good Scott Walker, which was sort of depressing

yeah the razor & Tie one. Marshall Crenshaw was a R&T artist and was the one who pushed the label to do it. I used to work there and helped MC write the notes. I was always trying to get them to do shit that would be competitive with Rhino and Ryko (the Joe Meek comp from 95 was my piece de resistance), but they were not equipped to market stuff like that. But stuff like hair metal hits of 80s? and later Kidz Bop? you bet!

really appreciate that some of you guys liked it, because it landed with a thud from where I sat.

For awhile there was a third Scott Walker who was a WRONG DUDE on Spotify, seems to have gone now

There is also a fourth Scott Walker, a former hockey player who was with the Nashville Predators of the NHL for most of his career (which ended about a decade ago.) And a fifth Scott Walker was a character actor who always seemed to play the bad guy (as in the Muppets Movie.)

the Joe Meek comp from 95 was my piece de resistance

Man, you did that one as well? I doubly thank you! That was also my introduction to that genius.

Come come, everyone knows the former St Mirren centre half, Scott Walker, is the second most famous Scott Walker.

And Alloa, as immortalised in Scott Walker plays for Alloa

So we now have Scott Walkers 1-4 and Scott Til' The Band Comes In.

Scott Scores Goals From His TV Series.

Holy crap @ these two Ute Lemper tracks THANK YOU whoever first recommended them. These are beyond incredible

Also I really like Scott's basic latter-day songwriting "thing": put a bunch of surprising and contrasting sections in a row, then repeat them exactly (with different words), and only once. It's the most distilled form of formal minimalism: it happens, and then it happens once more, then it's over.

Great to see people discovering those xp

The moment when the strings come in on Clara gives me goosebumps every time. So harrowing. RIP old man.

Here is an interview from the 1984

I'm interested to what extent his influence is still present in mainstream UK culture. Do people in the UK karaoke his shit? I would fucking love that; I went to pick up my daughter since my last post and I sang "Jackie" at the top of my lungs in the car…

It is bizarre at this point that there is nothing on this in the NYT; they clearly are asleep at the switch. Is Pareles too busy at Big Ears? It's odd to consider, but Scott is far far too rockist for Caramanica; if Thom Yorke or other 40somethings rep for anything, Caramanica turns up his nose. But Scott is right up Ratliff's alley; it would have been up at like noon if he was still there.

Fwiw Le Monde published an excellent obituary this morning.

Er, this afternoon. Still.

I can't remember whether it was Mixing It on R3 or Radcliffe's Hit The North on R5 where I first heard "Boychild". Summer 1990 and Fontana had just put out that compilation (savaged by Steve Sutherland in Melody Maker, while praising the Brothers' hits). That was the moment for me. I recall the strange fuss about his 3-sec appearance in that Britvic ad (which wasn't long after Climate) - as if he'd been missing for decades.

I (a yank) learned about Scott from Roni Sarig's book The Secret History of Rock and Roll, a U.S. publication that I bought while studying abroad in England in 2001. That book introduced me to some other acts too — Serge Gainsbourg, Swell Maps, Young Marble Giants.

People have been posting the more difficult bits on Facebook but hearing The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore on the news was just epic.

i can't even process this news. have been a fan since drag city released tilt in... 1996?

maybe because SW basically started his career over several times, he seemed particularly youthful. so this really comes as a shock.

This morning in my room

A little swallow was trapped

It flew around desperately

Until it fell exhausted on my bed

I picked it up

So as not to frighten it

I opened the window

Then I opened my hand

The cracking voice on the last line is devastating.

the Joe Meek comp from 95 was my piece de resistance

oh, my partner and i bonded over this being in both of our collections. we both know all the songs by heart. it's fabulous. i've gotten several joe meek compilations (even a big box set) since and it's just too much of a good thing... the CD you put together is a perfect distillation of his work. so thank you!!!!!