Even if you don't buy into the myth of Scott Walker as patron saint of romantic gloom, you have to admit that there is no one who could do what he did exactly as he did it with The Walker Brothers. Even when we've heard the songs before - and we usually have - they are always darker yet prettier than you could have imagined. If you happened to have flipped over "The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine (Anymore)" - a hard thing to do, I know - you, too, may have found yourself as I did last night: dead tired with a wide awake mind that seemed to have nothing to think about. Over and over, my mind could only spin Scott's story as the string section tried to paint a different, happier, story while lingering above the world's loneliest bar at closing time.
I woke up exhausted, emptied the house, and filled it again with the ever familiar story, now my own, minus the pigeon and, thankfully, a night as empty as Scott's to anticipate.
