How a slur by Proby led me full-Tilt into Scott’s world of Gothic genius
About 35 years ago, I’d just finished an interview for a morning newspaper with pop crock PJ Proby.
Jim was making yet another comeback, this time by claiming that Madonna was singing on the notorious Savoy Sessions, his latest recording.
Of course she wasn’t and she was apparently threatening to sue him. What did she expect to get? Some ring-pulls and a few bottle tops?
So I’d called him.
I’d met Jim many times and this was just another stop along the way to the bottom of a Jack Daniels bottle.
But what surprised me more was his claim that the enigmatic Scott Walker was having an affair with Jacques Brel, the French doyen of songs of poetry and pomp.
Scott had sung many of them including Mathilde, Amsterdam and the heartbreaking If You Go Away.
Yes, over the years there had been hints of Brel being gay or bisexual in the French media. But that simply made him seem more exotic and charming.
But Scott?
There had never been any suggestion that he was gay.
I remember feeling a bit angry at Proby, who had rapidly become an inglorious singer most famous for repeatedly losing his career and falling off the stage drunk.
Anyway, I had met Scott years ago and despite his waif-like wasted elegance and the androgynous of the 60s and 70s there was nothing to suggest Proby wasn’t making this up as well.
Besides, Scott was married.
Yep, I was angry with Proby…
Anyway, round about then – it would have been 3pm – the office tea trolley squeaked and creaked across the editorial floor followed by another trolley which brought the latest review copies of CDs and tapes of the likes of Mariah Carey, Boyz II Men, TLC and Hootie & the Blowfish.
And there it was, Tilt… the new Scott Walker album – 11 years late as far as his die-hard fans were concerned.
I studied the paper artwork inside the slightly scratched plastic box it had arrived in. The original ‘rare’ jewel case had been ‘nicked’ of course.
But the cover imagery itself was darker than even Climate of the Hunter, a decade earlier, had managed to be… a mangle of eyes and fingers and the sensuality of high heels and stockings… the eyes were dark and brooding, yet lights pocked them like tears and pearls. There was also what could have easily been a distorted cartoon of Marilyn Monroe, dress drawn out into a flying saucer as it billowed around her waist …
But the gnarled-looking hand had me from the start. It turned out it was Scott’s. Hard, gnarled and dead. Scott was in his early 40s but that hand held its own story.
I left the office early claiming that I was going to drive to Prestwich where Proby was holed up in a grubby house rolling in discarded cans of super lager. It stood next to the Halfway House pub where by now he would be holding his addled court and telling tales and half-truths about Elvis.
I poured out of the big glass Art Deco office on Gt Ancoats Street, found my car and thought ‘stuff Proby’. I would be far more interesting to know what Walker had been doing.
So I turned left towards the dark Stockport garret I called home.
I was recently divorced and lived in two rooms on the top floor of on old dolorous Victorian house, heavy in dampness and ghosts. As I closed the big oak door I flicked the switch on my electric fire, pulled the curtains shut and switched on my midi-cd player. It hummed as it waited for my new cd.
And so it began. Something abandoned … other worldly, disembodied. Scott had created a burnt-out landscape, not smouldering, not smokey but stark, a place where only the dead could walk.
“… who’ll give me 21, 21…”
Scott Walker, that handsomeness of a smile had created the loneliest place in the universe.
And he was comfortable there. His voice was a clear sonorous bell – just like the opening of Farmer in the City… but it was now a clarion cry of surrealism over elements of industrial rock, Zappa. opera and aria.
And of course there is his dark Gothic poetry.
Tilt threw out everything that we recognised of the Walker Brothers and even Brel. Now we had a new classical music. Tilt is a masterpiece. It isn’t easy listening like My Ship is Coming In or Like Walking in the Rain but it is astonishing when put up against them.
Which is better? The pop or the Art?
I think we just thank our gods for allowing this man to walk and create among us for more than half a century.
##SCOTTWALKER #walkerbrothers #engel #pjproby #jacquesbrel #brel #tilt #myshipiscomingin #walkingintherain #climateofthehunter #manchester #stockport #gtancoatsstreet
Do i hear
21
21
21
i’ll give you
21
21
21
Do i hear
21
21
21
i’ll give you
21
21
21
This night you
are mistaken
i’m a farmer
in the city
Dark farm
houses
against the
sky
Every night
i must wonder why
Harness on the
left nail keeps
wrinkling wrinkling
Then higher above
me – e e so o
e e e so o o
Can’t go by
a man from
Rio
Can’t go by
a man from
Vigo
Can’t go by
a man from
Ostia
Hey Ninetto
Remember that
dream
we talked about
it
so many times
Do i hear
21
21
21
i’ll give you
21
21
21
Do i hear
21
21
21
i’ll give you
21
21
21
And if i’m not
mistaken
We can search
from farm to
farm
Dark farm houses
against our eyes
Every night i
must realize
Harness on the
left nail
keeps withering withering
Then higher above
me e e so o
e e e so o o
Can’t go by
a man in
this shirt
Can’t go by
a man in
that shirt
Can’t go by
a man with brain
grass
go by his long
long eye
gas
And i used
to be a
citizen
i never felt
the pressure
i knew nothing
of the horses
Nothing of the
thresher
Paulo
take me with
you
it was the
journey of
life
Do i hear
21
21
21
i’ll give you
21
21
21
Do i hear
21
21
21
i’ll give you
21
21
21
12 Replies to “How a slur by Proby led me full-Tilt into Scott’s world of Gothic genius”
Krystyn Johnson
Mesmerising article.
Nice.
Tilt is a very brilliant album full of surprises along each track. It’s nothing like I have ever heard before or never will. This man Noel Scott Engel (Scott Walker) was a genius of high proportion. I love Tilt.
Kathleen Dickinson
Great piece, Leigh and how wise to take the CD and run in the opposite direction to PJ!
I agree with everything Morag & Corinne have said!
Pretty sad that some feel good by trying to pull down better people, with greater talents than themselves. He was like that as far back as the 60s and had a ‘go’ at Scott and the WBs even then but it never dulled their appeal!😁
Corinne Elliott
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Thanks for posting, Leigh – loved reading that! I have followed all eras of Scott’s creativity, right from the beginning (at least, in the UK) from 1965. Like so many of us who first discovered him in the Walker Brothers, this was quite a difficult era for us to understand – at first. But, if you really tried to follow Scott’s creative thinking (and you knew the breadth of literature, arts & music that he enjoyed), then I think you could begin to understand a bit more. But it’s not ‘easy listening’ and is more like modern opera – and it’s best to listen with the headphones on. Right from the beginning, he wanted his fans to listen properly to the lyrics and appreciate the music. That wonderful voice of his come through, even in a higher register 🎶
Hi I am very similar to you…..becoming so attentive to Scott,s voice & lyrics from 1965. I am now 71, and there has been NO LET-UP to my devotion, awareness or amazement at Scott,s creativity and talent and persona. I can put-on & play “Mrs. Murphy” at any time now….and the sheer pleasure and satisfaction at the 60,s simplicity and the lyric delves right into my soul …it,s INEXPLICABLE ! The uniqueness of the man astonishes me. I do wish SUNDOG had been THICKER !!!! The latter poems remind me of Paul Celan. I had his pin-ups on my walls since 1965, they exuded a mystery, a certain magic, of a handsome man, but also of one so very human. I’m revelling at all the images and snippets that come out of the Memorial-site, having lived in Tasmania for most of my life I WAS isolated from the mainstream, only having FAB208,RAVE and Melody Maker here in Australia…..but I now realise I was NOT alone……and that gives me great satisfaction. The 1960,s were sheer magic for me, I delved into all the music, We cannot go back in time, I know Scott was flesh & blood like all of us, fatherhood, divorce, alcohol . all that & more…the years are flying-by now, the World is changing so fast, but I still maintain my joy in ALL his albums……..
Thanks for your message mate … very interesting to hear how life was for you back in the 60s … if you ever feel like writing more about it, we’d be happy to publish it on the site! Lots of music material on the site – have a scroll through the pages, there are a lot of them – but also lots about everybody from Nick Cave and Bob Dylan to Gerry Marsden and PJ Proby!
“Tilt” was a triumph for Scott and “Farmer” possibly the best song he ever wrote. Proby has said expressed his envy of Scott many times. Scott reported he got soused before he was supposed to meet Brel, and missed the opportunity.
Proby recorded for Savoy in the early to mid 80’s and the ‘Madonna scandal’ was around 84 when ‘Hardcore’ – the track in question – was first released. Although these Savoy sessions were re released on CD in ’95, I don’t think Proby promoted them – he disowned them after getting sober in 92. ‘Tilt’ was released in ’95. So am a bit confused by your timeline.
Yep, my timeline is out, thank you! will sort it! Well spotted! Sometimes you are older than you think…
cheers
Leigh