Scott Walker pop hero dies aged 76

Scott Walker, one of the most innovative and enduring songwriters of the 20th century, has died aged 76.

The news was announced by his label, 4AD. “For half a century, the genius of the man born Noel Scott Engel has enriched the lives of thousands,” a statement read. The cause of death has not been announced.

Walker first came to fame in the mid-1960s in the group the Walker Brothers, before creating a string of acclaimed solo albums – Scott I to Scott IV – that are regarded as some of the most adventurous and boundary-pushing pop albums of the era.

He then moved further out to the periphery of the music scene, with an increasingly experimental run of albums, including 1995’s Tilt and 2006’s The Drift, which reflected on Mussolini’s mistress, Srebrenica and 9/11.

His most recent work was music composed for the Natalie Portman movie Vox Lux.

Walker was born Noah Scott Engel in Hamilton, Ohio in 1943, and grew up in California. In 1964, he teamed up with John Maus – who was naming himself John Walker – and became the duo the Walker Brothers. Their drummer Gary Leeds was a veteran from the nascent “swinging London” pop music scene, and persuaded them to relocate to London, where Walker has been based ever since.

They scored two No 1 hits with Make It Easy On Yourself and The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine (Anymore), and their dapper, hirsute image earned them heartthrob status – their fanclub once had more members than the Beatles. While these chart-topping hits were cover versions, Walker was also writing his own material – the pressure of which partly prompted the breakup of the group. “Everyone relied on me, and it just got on top of me. I think I just got irritated with it all,” he said – they disbanded in 1967.

Walker went solo, and continued to make symphonic 1960s pop, albeit with an epic, psychedelic, high-minded tone – The Seventh Seal, from Scott 4, reflected on the existential fantasies in Ingmar Bergman’s film of the same name.

In the 1970s, he reverted to cover versions for a string of albums, but then reunited with the Walker Brothers. Their albums included the highly regarded Nite Flights (1978), which featured four Walker-penned songs, featuring dark moods and the use of electronics: it was to foreshadow the work he would do in the latter part of his career.

Walker, for his part, felt that he was continually honing his work. “I can rate them, the albums, as I go along,” he told the Guardian in 2018. “Not the early ones, because I’ve no idea any more, but I can say the success rate of, say, Tilt, was about – from what I wanted to get – 65%. And then the next album was 75%, and on and on until I hit Soused, which was pretty perfect.”