A largely muted and mid-tempo affair, only really catching fire on Tracks Three, Five and Seven (yup, that's their titles - Walker didn't want song titles to 'get in the way' for half of the album), Climate Of Hunter is an intriguing cross between an 80s update of his late 60s albums and a pointer towards Tilt a decade later, with song structures gradually dissolving here. The seven Walker compositions show his wordplay becoming ever more abstract, and the closing cover of Tenessee Williams' Blanket Roll Blues, backed only by Mark Knopfler on bluesy guitar, suits Walker down to the ground. More next week.
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Previously posted at SGTG: Tilt | Soused
A seriously neglected work. Though in some ways, even though it's not as extreme overall, in a way it's harder to get a firmer hold of than most of Tilt. As bizarre as it seems on the surface to say, most of the songs on Tilt have stronger "hooks" than what's on here.
ReplyDeleteBut I love it. I'd probably pick "Sleepwalkers Woman" as the best track. (Could have been on Scott 3 - what higher praise could you give?) And Billy Ocean does a damn fine John Maus harmony impersonation on Track Three.
Totally hear you on that first paragraph - when I first got hold of this, on vinyl, I remember thinking it was like a ghost of an album, like it had no solid form at all. Just oozes through your consciousness, then it's gone... kudos to him for such a slim runtime too, suits it perfectly.
DeleteThat's not to dismiss your 2nd para, bang on too... wonder if this was the strangest record Ocean & Knopfler ever appeared on?
DeleteScott shared management with Dire Straits at the time of recording which is how Knopfler is here. Must have been fun managing Scott in the 80s. Ocean had been on GTO Records at the same time as the reformed Walker Brothers in the mid-late 70s which is how they link up. Ocean's slightly panicked harmony vocal on "Track Three" works perfectly in my opinion. This was bizarrely my introduction to Scott Walker in 1986 and what a place to start.
DeleteThank you so much for this Masterpiece. I think in this Scott takes the sounds of the eighties to another level.
ReplyDeleteA great great album. Julian Cope's 'Godlike Genius' was on one side of my intro tape, and this on the other.
ReplyDelete'Tilt' was the last point at which I could still feel love for Scott's works. After that I could summon some admiration at times but not much more.