Scott Walker - 30th Century Man

Synopsis:  In the 1960s there was a time when Scott Walker (b. Noel Scott Engel 9 January 1943) and his band The Walker Brothers were bigger than The Beatles. Their hit The Sun Ain’t Going to Shine Anymore had screaming teens joining their fan club by the thousands. Then Scott went solo and after a few successful-ish albums, he vanished from the public eye. Twenty years later he returned with a series of experimental albums that confounded the record buying public and critics alike.

A glance at the talking heads who enthusiastically discuss Walker shows you just how revered he is. Executive producer David Bowie joins Brian Eno, Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker, members of Radiohead, Damon Albarn from Blur and Alison Goldfrapp all who wax lyrical about their love for Walker and his increasingly esoteric records. Scott Walker - 30^th Century Man is a beautifully put-together documentary; mixing vintage footage from throughout Walker’s career with newly-created visual accompaniments to some of his best-known tracks to perfectly encapsulate the artist’s fragile persona. It’s a testament to his popularity that he was given his own television show Scott in the late '60s and even more remarkable that he continued to confound his studio and home audience by insisting on covering the works of Jacques Brel. It’s not surprising that the show didn’t last long. That’s one of the fascinating thing about Walker; he seemingly had it all but steadfastly refused to cater to his fans’ expectations.

The film’s trump card is the access that Kijak has been given to Walkers recording studio during sessions for his then forthcoming album The Drift. The delight the filmmakers must have felt when Walker produced a large leg of pork to be used by the percussionist to create punching sounds on the track Clara is one of those moments that documentary filmmakers dream of catching. The track is about the public stringing-up of Mussolini, not typical subject matter for a pop song and is the perfect marker to the point where Walker’s career has arrived. Even more thrilling is the interview with Walker who  has not spoken in in public for years.

It could be said that Scott Walker - 30^th Century Man does preach to the converted but there is still much to enjoy for the Walker tyro. If you are not a fan of Walker ‘s melodramatic baritone croon you will probably not warm to his increasingly strange behaviour but for this reviewer, the sight of someone punching a side of pork in the name of rock was the icing on a fabulous cake. Walker’s underrated repertoire has, at last, been given the tribute it justly deserves.

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