The album was a comeback of sorts for Walker, following a decade and a half of commercial decline and artistic frustration, and coming off the heels of a renewed interest in his 1960s work from the UK post-punk and indie scene.

Walker wrote the songs for the album between August and September 1983, and it was recorded between October and December 1983 in the UK at The Town House, EMI and Sarm West Studios.

No Regrets and Lines had continued the musical vein of Walker's recent solo work, with neither album including any original songs by him.

Walker's songwriting displayed remarkable growth from his 1960s work and had more in common with the music of David Bowie, Brian Eno and Lou Reed.

The extremely dark and discomforting sound of Scott's songs, particularly "The Electrician", was to prove a forerunner to the direction of his future solo work.

In the period after the album Walker was without a record deal, and remarked in an interview with the journalist Alan Bangs that he had lived on "not a lot" between Nite Flights and Climate of Hunter.

The resulting songs are driven by and founded on Peter Van Hooke's drums, Mo Foster's bass and Walker's vocals.

He explained in a TV interview on music programme The Tube that the songs were complete and that titles might "lopside" or "overload" them, presumably giving undue weight to one line of the lyric over the others.

"[10] A 2002 review in Unsung agreed: "I believe the time is right for a reassessment of an album that, unlike so many released in the 1980's, has dated very little and, weird as it is, actually seems to make sounder sense now than it ever did.

"[11] All tracks composed by Scott Walker, August–September 1983, except "Blanket Roll Blues" (words by Tennessee Williams, music by Kenyon Hopkins).