Scott Walker "The Drift"

John

I've been spinning this a lot over the last couple of months and I've seen it pop up in many end of year best of lists yet I rarely hear of anyone that isn't a critic praising it. Has anyone else bought this amazing album? It is probably one of the strangest things I've heard in years, the sheer weirdness reminds me of when I discovered Nurse With Wound, so many influences mashed together with something completely original. I highly recommend it to say the least.

Ghost Rider

Howya, John. I'm a big fan of Scott's stuff so it's amazing and shameful that I still haven't heard all of "The Drift". The two tracks I have heard sounded excellent, though.

You should check out his 1995 album "Tilt", if you haven't already. It's haunted, fractured, operatic and utterly singular.

John wrote:

I've been spinning this a lot over the last couple of months and I've seen it pop up in many end of year best of lists yet I rarely hear of anyone that isn't a critic praising it. Has anyone else bought this amazing album? It is probably one of the strangest things I've heard in years, the sheer weirdness reminds me of when I discovered Nurse With Wound, so many influences mashed together with something completely original. I highly recommend it to say the least.

John

My next post was going to be looking for suggestions for other Scott Walker albums, cheers Ghost Rider!

Have you seen the trailer for the documentary Scott Walker: 30 Century Man? It looks amazing (especially the behind the scenes footage from The Drift recording sessions). Linky here.

voidoid

Easily my favourite album of 2006. Really needs to be played at night. Makes Tom Waits look like a cartoon.

toonarmy

its a very hard album to get into, loved the opening track on 'Tilt'.

John

That's true, the first couple of times I found it very challenging but I have really gotten into it over the last while. There's not enough albums like this, that require work to get into but are worth the effort.

Ghost Rider

As for further listening, I heartily recommend Scott Walker's first four solo albums "Scott 1", "Scott 2", "Scott 3" and "Scott 4" too. They're not experimental in any real sense but even within their stylistic confines they do prefigure the melodrama of the more recent albums.

And for anyone who likes well crafted, well written and awesomely performed songs (remember them?) they can't be beat.

Ghost Rider

Haven't seen it but have been looking forward to the documentary for a while. Will check out the link.

There was some kind of interview with the man on an arts programme on BBC4 about six months ago. It was kind of a crappy interview, largely comprising vacuous questions about his supposed reclusiveness, but it was enough to whet my appetite for the doc itself.

John wrote:

My next post was going to be looking for suggestions for other Scott Walker albums, cheers Ghost Rider!

Have you seen the trailer for the documentary Scott Walker: 30 Century Man? It looks amazing (especially the behind the scenes footage from The Drift recording sessions). Linky here.

smackbunnybaby

voidoid wrote:

Easily my favourite album of 2006. Really needs to be played at night. Makes Tom Waits look like a cartoon.

i have scott walkers album drift , but as of yet it is still in my to do pile.
i think i will have to drag it out asap.

however that is a bold yet intriguing statement to make about tom waits...

Robin Parmar

Actually I agree with the Tom Waits opinion. His work has always sounded so fake to me: "oh look, i'm a tramp!"

As for "The Drift", I have not been able to assimilate it in the same way I did "Tilt". Both are flawed works, partially because there's no-one on the projects with the weight to reign in Walker's excesses, not all of which work. And partially because his voice has not necessarily weathered all that well.

That said, they are both brilliant albums, far beyond what most artists even think of attempting. Dark and deeply disturbing.

I too would recommend "Scott 1" through 4, and also the next record, "' Til the Band Comes In", which is at least half a great record. It's worth it for "Little Things (That Keep Us Together)". Putting together just the Engels compositions from these five records makes for an amazing slice of orchestrated pop theatrics.

His eighties effort "Climate Of Hunter" was unusual but pretty half-baked. In fact I remember selling my vinyl copy years ago, something I rather regret now.

But don't overlook the Walker Brothers' "Nite Flights". The four Scott Walker tracks on this are an early sign of where he was going, way out in to uncharted sonic territory.

Ghost Rider

Interesting thoughts there. I don't agree with you about Tom Waits, though. Why would the fact he's a "fake" (i.e. not a tramp) matter? After all, we don't require that movie actors be "real" - why would we require it of musicians/singers? Even Scott Walker's songs have frequently involved him enacting parts (as is part of the Brecht/Weill tradition to which both Waits and Walker are so indebted), yet I suspect you don't question that fakeness.

Or maybe you just think Tom Waits is a bad actor, in which case I'll still disagree, but as an opinion it'll be fair enough!

(By the way, do we need a Tom Waits thread here...?)

Robin Parmar wrote:

Actually I agree with the Tom Waits opinion. His work has always sounded so fake to me: "oh look, i'm a tramp!"

As for "The Drift", I have not been able to assimilate it in the same way I did "Tilt". Both are flawed works, partially because there's no-one on the projects with the weight to reign in Walker's excesses, not all of which work. And partially because his voice has not necessarily weathered all that well.

That said, they are both brilliant albums, far beyond what most artists even think of attempting. Dark and deeply disturbing.

I too would recommend "Scott 1" through 4, and also the next record, "' Til the Band Comes In", which is at least half a great record. It's worth it for "Little Things (That Keep Us Together)". Putting together just the Engels compositions from these five records makes for an amazing slice of orchestrated pop theatrics.

His eighties effort "Climate Of Hunter" was unusual but pretty half-baked. In fact I remember selling my vinyl copy years ago, something I rather regret now.

But don't overlook the Walker Brothers' "Nite Flights". The four Scott Walker tracks on this are an early sign of where he was going, way out in to uncharted sonic territory.

PiE

Falling asleep to this album is an... interesting experience.

JLemmon

The boxset "In 5 easy Pieces" is a good place to look if you have no other scott walker material it goes from the walkers up to "Tilt"
The song "The Plague" is like Nick cave 30 years earlier

John

I ordered Tilt yesterday

Ghost Rider

This documentary about Scott Walker, referred to earlier in this thread, gets a screening at the Dublin Film Festival on Sunday February 18th:

http://www.dubliniff.com/films/schedule/2007/2/18

John

Brilliant, I've just booked my ticket for it. Anyone else going?

Ghost Rider

(Al-) mos def.

John wrote:

Brilliant, I've just booked my ticket for it. Anyone else going?

nlgbbbblth

The Drift is very good but at this moment I still prefer Tilt.

Scott Walker's Five Easy Pieces box is worth getting as an overview - bad liner notes although the reissue seems to have improved these.

also recommend

Scott LPs 1 - 4
Til The Band Comes In
Climate Of Hunter
Classics and Collectibles (good compilation with 20 tracks making their CD debut)

Walker Brothers box set Everything Under The Sun is amazing too. In a different way.

John

Cheers for the recommendations nlgbbbblth.

30 Century Man is on this Saturday. Who's going and wants to meet up?

Ghost Rider

John, did you go see this? If so, how was it?

Couldn't make it in the end, myself.

John wrote:

Cheers for the recommendations nlgbbbblth.

30 Century Man is on this Saturday. Who's going and wants to meet up?

John

It was a great movie but the sound was distorted during any of the loud bits (so pretty much all the music clipped horribly). Aside from the sound, it was brilliant. Nice interviews with Walker and with his many celebrity admirers. Covered everything from The Walker Brothers up to his next plans (to record an album that is possible to tour with!).

Ghost Rider

Will definitely check it out if it gets a release here.

As for the sound, was it purely a result of the IFI's sound system? Or was it just a badly mastered soundtrack?

John wrote:

It was a great movie but the sound was distorted during any of the loud bits (so pretty much all the music clipped horribly). Aside from the sound, it was brilliant. Nice interviews with Walker and with his many celebrity admirers. Covered everything from The Walker Brothers up to his next plans (to record an album that is possible to tour with!).

John

It sounded like the soundsystem. It's a few years since I saw a film with sound at the IFI (mainly silent movies have drawn me in there of late) so needless to say I was shocked at how poor it was. Of course I didn't get up to complain because I was afraid I'd miss something important!

Ghost Rider

That surprises me as I've always found the sound at the IFI to be really good.

Maybe the thing was projected from DVD was it? Sometimes they do that if they don't have a film print (much to my annoyance). In that case, maybe the sound system was misconfigured or they were using the amp in the DVD projector or something...

John wrote:

It sounded like the soundsystem. It's a few years since I saw a film with sound at the IFI (mainly silent movies have drawn me in there of late) so needless to say I was shocked at how poor it was. Of course I didn't get up to complain because I was afraid I'd miss something important!