Very sad, I was a student in Birmingham from 1981. The Beat and its inspiration, were a key part of my young adulthood.
Very sad. Victim of cancer at 56. Great music. Any relation to Ken (no, not Sema !)? It's not exactly a common surname.
'The Beat' were very frequent visitors to the Tolpuddle Martyrs Festival. Very surreal experience watching them - they were part of the Ska revival of my childhood/early adolescence but I was forbidden to buy records/music by my mother as "...it was a waste of money..." so I finally got to see a band I 'followed' on the radio in my late 40's...
Still one of my Desert Island Discs - Although I wouldn't go on there if they asked me now, not now Kirsty's not hosting it.
Hadn't heard. What a voice & what weirdness in Tilt & others from the experimental phase. From the NYT: Along the way, he found an admirer in David Bowie. Mr. Bowie, a transcendent musical experimenter, was in a relationship with a woman who had dated Mr. Walker and kept his albums. Mr. Bowie listened to the music and became so enamored that he later took the role of executive producer of “Scott Walker: 30 Century Man” (2007), a documentary directed by Stephen Kijak. “I like the way he can paint a picture with what he says,” Mr. Bowie said in the film. “I had no idea what he was singing about. And I didn’t care.”
