Scott Walker's solo career is usually divided into three stages:
1)increasingly adventurous and Francophile orchestral pop (SCOTT 1-4)
2)Roxy/Bowie-esque art-rock (the Walker Brothers' NITE FLIGHTS & CLIMATE OF HUNTER)
3)a full embrace of noise, with influences from 20th-century classical music (TILT onwards)
He disliked the albums he released in the early '70s, before rejoining the Walker Brothers. STRETCH & WE HAD IT ALL made it out on a CD reissue in the '90s, but ever since then they've been out of print for download and physical purchase. I listened to both for the first time today. They're not bad at all, but they feel like the most awkward Walker music I've heard. The country focus on WE HAD IT ALL makes it a bit grittier; STRETCH has elements of country, but it veers more towards MOR easy listening. (Its eclecticism doesn't work as well - the foray into funk on a cover of Bill Withers' "Use Me" is awfully pallid.) His taste in covers is usually pretty good - apart from doing an Eagles song on WE HAD IT ALL - and in theory, there's no reason he couldn't bite into Withers, Randy Newman and Tom T. Hall as much as he did with Jacques Brel. His skill as a crooner comes across on the ballads. Still, his voice sounds slightly off. Part of this is that he affects a southern twang which wasn't his actual accent - I had to remind myself Walker was American - and that the country elements have a degree of cosplay. But you can tell that he'd rather be singing his own compositions, even when he's covering very good songs. However, WE HAD IT ALL is no disgrace, and I don't think they deserve to be written out of the Walker discography.
