Scott Walker has died at the age of 76…
OBITUARY by David Parker
Scott Walker, one of The Walker Brothers, whose hits were The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore and Make It Easy On Yourself has died.
The singer was said to be “one of the most revered innovators at the sharp end of creative music.”
Walker was an actor before hooking up with John Maus and Gary Leeds to form the Walker Brothers.
At one time, the band was as big as the Beatles, greeted by screaming fans everywhere.
“It was fantastic for the first couple of albums or so but it really wears you down,” Walker told the BBC’s Culture Show in 2006.
“Touring in those days was very primitive. It was really a lot of hard work, and you couldn’t find anything good to eat. The hours were unbelievable.”
At the height of their fame in 1967, when Walker was still considered a heartthrob and a potential superstar, he called time on the band and went to a monastery on the Isle of Wight to study Gregorian chant.
He remained disillusioned with the industry until his girlfriend introduced him to the music of Jacques Brel, whose literate, passionate torch songs inspired him to embark on a solo career.
Walker’s first four solo albums, Scott to Scott 4, were a mix of orchestral pop with dark existentialism, and lyrics included prostitutes, transvestites, suicidal thinkers, and even Joseph Stalin.
Walker staged a brief, largely unsuccessful reunion with the Brothers in the mid-70s, then used a lucrative deal with Virgin Records to pursue some of his most abstract musical ideas on 1984’s Climate of Hunter.
The record divided fans and critics – it was reputedly Virgin’s lowest-selling album of all time – and Walker bowed out of music and the public eye for almost a decade.