Scott Walker’s long and diverse career is one of the strangest life stories in pop. No Regrets: Writings On Scott Walker is a new collection of critical essays that together analyse the mind and muse of a performer who went from 60s teen-pop idol to his current incarnation as a composer of apocalyptic avant rock that exposes the horror and torment of a world on the brink.

Edited by Rob Young, author of Electric Eden and a Contributing Editor to The Wire, the book boasts contributions from a number of Scott experts and observers including Biba Kopf, David Toop, David Stubbs, Damon Krukowski and others. Via discussion of Walker’s epochal recordings, the book examines the life, music and times of a singer-songwriter who has traversed four decades of pop history, from the 60s heyday of The Walker Brothers' blue-eyed soul to the operatic intensity and conceptual depths of his most recent albums Tilt and The Drift.

In this edition of The Wire Salon, Rob Young will give an illustrated talk that synthesizes No Regrets’ multiple texts to delve ever further into the reclusive cult of Scott. The talk will be followed by a panel discussion with three of the book's contributors: cultural critics Ian Penman and Nina Power, and Chris Sharp, the former head of 4AD and the man who signed Scott to the label.

No Regrets: Writings On Scott Walker is published by Orion Books in association with The Wire.

Scott Walker at 4AD

The Wire Salon is a monthly series of salon events, hosted by The Wire magazine, and dedicated to the fine art and practice of thinking and talking about sound and music. The events consist of talks, panel discussions, film screenings and DJ sets.

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