New Scott Walker album announced

Just spotted via ILM:

We’re delighted to announce that Scott Walker has completed work on his first album for the label. The long-awaited new album – called “The Drift” – will be Scott’s first since the ground-breaking “Tilt” was released in 1995. 4AD will release the album worldwide in May. The exact date will be announced shortly. A documentary film about Scott’s music – including the making of “The Drift” – is being made by the New York -based director Stephen Kijak. Titled “30 Century Man”, it will also be released in 2006.

Expectation increases from this moment on. Also a degree of nervousness: I’d rather hear nothing more from Walker than anything that dilutes the impact of Tilt. Most amusing response on ILM has to be this one:

‘Tilt’ still hasn’t quite sunk in for me. And now I’ve got a whole new album to ponder over? He should give us a little more time between releases.

Ian Penman’s brief preview proves promising:

It’s called “The Drift”.Ten tracks (last one acoustic just like Tilt and Climate of Hunter). Like Tilt only more so – darker, stranger, further out, further in. Astonishing stuff. Three or four of the tracks (at least) career highlights: so powerful I had to listen to it in two or three track bursts. Tracks two and three actually disabled me for about 45 minutes after (the way “The Electrician” and “Farmer In The City” did when I first heard them, only more so). If you got Tilt, you’ll love this. “Haunting” doesn’t begin to do justice to its emotional complexity.
Inspirational: a 63 year old who makes musicians – artists – a third his age seem like cop outs; and makes 53 or 63 (or 46) seem like a good age to really start living… Worth the wait – and then some.

Assuming he’s referring to Tilt’s extension of Climate Of Hunter, a similar extending of Climate seems sort of unimaginable. There’s a lot of good snippets of info on the ILM thread that make it well worth sifting through, including this link to The Wire’s 1995 interview with him which starts thus:

Well, I have to ask. Where have you been all this time? “Who knows, right? Hanging out. Doing a little travelling. Nothing constructive.”