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I went to see the new Scott Walker documentary the other day.  Really enjoyed it, thanks.  The Drift was one of my favourite albums of last year, even if at no point did I get even close to writing about it.  I still wouldn’t know where to begin.  Sensibly, Thirtieth Century Man begins at the beginning, charting the descent of Scott Walker from the Walker Brothers era through the eponymous four, (ignoring the fallow decade to follow), reawakening with the where-the-devil-did-that-come-from Nite Flights, before wandering awed through the black three.

A career of such ludicrous contrast is well represented by some near-surreal juxtaposition: a performance on the Frankie Howerd show, Jacques Brel’s earnest emotion versus his faintly comedic sweaty visage, Lulu nodding along reverentially to Tilt’s majestic “Farmer In The City”, discussion of the bizarre video to “Sleepwalkers Woman” (“I don’t like to use the word comeback”) with Muriel Gray, Sting pontificating about existentialism, the first use in song of the word “pimpling” on the Jools Holland Show, Gavin Friday and Gavin Friday’s hair, and that footage of a percussionist punching a weighty slab of meat.

Scott Walker makes for a surprisingly frank and good-humoured interviewee, painstakingly wedded to an artistic vision that requires the construction of a giant pea and thimble game despite a keen knowledge of how ridiculous it will appear to an outsider.  Outsider?  What am I on about?  As if anyone could be more of an outsider than he is…