The Kinks - Album by Album (song by song)

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by mark winstanley, Apr 4, 2021.

  1. Zeki

    Zeki Forum Resident

    I just do the search after the rest of you point the way!
     
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  2. Steve E.

    Steve E. Doc Wurly and Chief Lathe Troll

    Location:
    Brooklyn, NY, USA
    Great song.

    There is a rather obvious lyric connection between "See My Friends" and "Waterloo Sunset"'s lines, with both referencing crossing a river and friends; the latter even intoned in a similar way.

    The first verse:

    But I don't need no friends....

    and then the last verse:

    But Terry and Julie cross over the river where they feel safe and sound
    And they don't need no friends
    As long as they gaze on Waterloo sunset they are in paradise


    Dave Davies, in a recent interview, has a great story about Paul McCartney approaching him when "See My Friends" was at #10. Here, he starts talking about "See My Friends" at 10:45. Then, at 11:35:



    "There used to be a club that I'd go to a lot.....and certain people like Keith Moon, and Jeff Beck used to go to a lot.... the Beatles would turn up, John Lennon....
    I remember See My Friends was #10 on the charts. Paul McCartney comes into the room and makes a beeline for me.
    He comes up to me and says 'See My Friends, what a fantastic record. I should have wrote that.'
    And I said to him, 'Well you didn't, did ya?'"

    *** *** ****

    I'd say the intro to the B-side is a flat-out prank.

     
    Last edited: May 6, 2021
  3. Zack

    Zack Senior Member

    Location:
    Easton, MD
    See My Friends really is the first English pop song to use Indian raga drones despite not using a sitar but extremely close-mic'ing an acoustic. Beats Norwegian Wood by a few months. Really groundbreaking. (Love that Dave quote!)

    Also, Ray's friends seem to be in his imagination. Or if they aren't, why are they across the river from him? More interesting stuff going on in the mind of Our Hero. And much more to come.
     
  4. bvb1123

    bvb1123 Rock and Roll Martian

    Location:
    Cincinnati Ohio
    See My Friends" One of my favorite Kinks' songs. I love the drone. Instruments sound great and Ray is in fine voice.

    "Never Met A Girl Like You Before" An ok, if somewhat forgettable tune. It's just a standard Kinks' track but 1000s of songwriters can only dream of writing a song of this caliber.
     
  5. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    and still, all I can think of when I read the title to today's b-side, is Iggy Pop....
     
  6. vanhooserd

    vanhooserd Senior Member

    Location:
    Nashville,TN
    "See My Friends" is one of my favorite Kinks records. It's "got the spook".
     
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  7. idleracer

    idleracer Forum Resident

    Location:
    California
    :kilroy: Exactly two years after this came out, George Harrison would use the same first three notes that begin the tune to also begin "Within You Without You." Yeah, that's how far ahead of the curve it was. Comparisons to "Norwegian Wood" are a bit off. That's merely a folk waltz with an Indian instrument. This manages to achieve an Indian feel without using any exotic instrumentation. Pete Townshend has sited this as being the main influence for "The Good's Gone," and needless to say, it also probably emboldened The Yardbirds to cough up rock 'n roll's first Gregorian chant, "Still I'm Sad" a few months later.

    :kilroy: To me, it sounds like Ray is half asleep and through a blurry haze, is watching his friends on the other side of the River Thames (a wide body of water) where they all look small and distant. It's like that Bm chord that begins the bridge is suddenly jarring him wide awake for a brief moment, and then, after a couple of measures, he settles back down into his substance induced half-dream.
    :D What can I say? With this track, Ray essentially invents The Monkees. "Gonna Buy Me A Dog," "Salesman" "Star Collector" and many of their other tracks sound a lot like this.
     
  8. Martyj

    Martyj Who dares to wake me from my slumber? -- Mr. Flash

    Location:
    Maryland, USA
    I need to invest more time in thoroughly familiarizing myself with his Americana LPs. I've listened to both about a half dozen times all the way through but they still haven't sunk in all the way for me. Anyway, thanks for the reminder.
     
  9. BZync

    BZync Senior Member

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    Well written, sir. You may be correct that this recording represented the Kinks take on psychedelia. After this (to my ears) they turned to a very British and music hall version of psychedelia and didn't revisit the dreamy sound of See My Friends very often. Wonderfully hypnotic.
     
  10. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    It really is.
    It's probably the biggest leap of appreciation for a song, I knew pretty well, so far in the thread.
     
  11. palisantrancho

    palisantrancho Forum Resident

    "See My Friends"

    I think everyone pretty much summed this one up! Excellent posts by everyone. Definitely one of the first of its kind in pop music. The psychedelic era and the doors to perception were right around the corner. It's crazy to think how quickly music advanced in this period. Something was in the sugar cubes in early 1965. The Kinks were ahead of the pack with this release, but the Yardbirds were also experimenting at the same time with these far out sounds. What a brilliant time to have been alive and in a band.

    "Never Met A Girl Like You Before"

    The A side sounds like the future and the B side sounds like the past. "See My Friends" probably took up most of Ray's energy so he probably knocked this song out in his sleep. It seems like an odd pairing, but I kind of like how it's so different from "See My Friends". Has he ever commented about this song and the intro? It may not be one of his greatest early songs, but it's over in two minutes and you can quickly flip it back over to hear the excellent A side again.
     
  12. Great posts about See My Friends, also one of my very favourite songs by The Kinks. As others have said, they reach another level here.

    Couple of bits. The lo-fi element is reduced when you play it on vinyl. But nevertheless it highlights that The Kinks would have benefited from a George Martin/Geoff Emerick/John Wood in the studio with them, many of their seminal recordings from this period continue to dazzle despite less than ideal sound production. In fact, I've been driven to collect these sixties recordings on vinyl to hear them in the best fidelity I can. It makes a difference. But when you compare the sound quality with The Beatles or The Byrds from the same period, they were definitely behind the curve.

    Regarding the river metaphor. I was thinking about the Nick Drake song River Man. I think it was Ian MacDonald who wrote a really in-depth piece about Nick Drake's lyrics, analysing the various metaphors and recurring images that he used. I remember thinking when I read it..... really? Did Nick Drake really mean that? Or did he just write the lyrics off the cuff and choose certain words because they just went with the music? And I think the same when we talk about Ray's use of the river in See My Friends. Did he really have all those associations in his head, or did he just write it in a stream of conscious process? I tend to think the latter. We project our own ideas onto these things later on, the artist just creates. Songs convey feelings and emotions rather than intellectual ideas - which is what we get with See My Friends.
     
  13. SeeDubs

    SeeDubs Forum Resident

    Location:
    Washington, DC
    I think you mean Edwyn Collins

     
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  14. Wondergirl

    Wondergirl Forum Resident

    Location:
    Massachusetts, USA
    Good catch! My husband is a Bunnymen fan so I told him to listen to that and he agrees. :)
     
  15. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    Yea, sorry... I always think of it as Iggy for some reason.
     
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  16. Wondergirl

    Wondergirl Forum Resident

    Location:
    Massachusetts, USA
    It seems See My Friends really inspired some great commentary today. I enjoyed reading it all. I really can't add anything that hasn't already been said. It's not a top favorite of mine (today...always subject to change), but it's clear to see it's greatness and how influential it was. It's truly haunting. Ray took a big chance with this one and it paid off.

    Never Met A Girl Like You Before
    I thought the beginning also sounded like a Beatles tune. It's escaping me which one. I'm kind of getting bored of songs about 'girls'. :D
     
  17. idleracer

    idleracer Forum Resident

    Location:
    California
    :kilroy: At this juncture, I think there's something worth acknowledging. From the period of July 1965 - September 1966, Ray Davies gave away a lot of songs (nine in all) that The Kinks never officially released, although the demos for a few of them eventually would wind up as bonus tracks on various CD re-issues. I'll post them over the next few weeks whenever they happen to pop up in the chronology of things. Feel free to comment, if you think they're worth commenting on. The first one:

    Dave Berry / This Strange Effect (July 1965)

    This is one of those records that is at a tempo that's difficult for people at a discotheque to dance to, but easy for the girls in the go-go cages to dance to. Like it's twin, "Tell Me Now, So I'll Know," I can easily imagine silhouettes of females doing vaguely Egyptian things with their arms and necks while it plays. The tune is in the key of E minor, and the verses make great use of the four chords, Em A D and C#. The bridge that begins at 0:54 throws in a G and a B7. There's some pretty nifty nylon string guitar playing throughout. It's a mystery to me why Ray would give something this good away when it would've fit perfectly on the "Kwyet Kinks" EP or the "Kontroversey" LP.

     
  18. Paul Mazz

    Paul Mazz Senior Member

    As long as you posted the Dave Berry:

     
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  19. Aftermath

    Aftermath Senior Member

    See My Friends:
    The moment where Ray's songwriting leaves the ground with the power of its imagery. Symbolism takes center stage here, and it hits deep.

    I imagine the death of his older sister, who gave Ray his first guitar for his birthday just before she died, must have been profound.
     
    Last edited: May 6, 2021
  20. All Down The Line

    All Down The Line The Under Asst East Coast White Label Promo Man

    Location:
    Australia
    Mark I think you nailed it with this post.
    Everybody is a weak single but a solid album track and when I hear Ray's vocal and lyrics and consider what was to come, i don't see this as looking to the future but see it as more of pops past.
     
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  21. palisantrancho

    palisantrancho Forum Resident

    This would have made more sense as the B side to "See My Friends". It is strange that that he would give this up. Nice song.

    It reminded me of the song (Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps), which Doris Day recorded in 1964. The Nat King Cole version from 1958 also sounds very much like it was an influence on Ray.

    Doris Day
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUVT1NZtZPo

    Nat King Cole
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5S4tZj56ZQ
     
    Last edited: May 6, 2021
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  22. markelis

    markelis Forum Resident

    Location:
    Miami Beach FL
    Well, I’m falling behind a bit already!

    Rather than going all the way back to the beginning and commenting on each song, I’ll just say that while most the songs off the first two albums were rose to the level of ok, they mainly just revealed a band trying to find its feet. That You Really Got Me and ADAAOTN, two absolute hard rocking classics that have not dimmed one iota in their power some 60 years after their release, appeared on these first two releases is mind boggling and should have made it obvious to anyone listening that something special was likely coming down the pike from this new band The Kinks.

    Of the three most recent singles, like everyone else said, Who Will be the Next in Line should have been the A side to the single and Everybody’s Gonna be Happy should’ve been the flip. Both are very cool songs if you’re a Kinks fan, although I can see why they are both songs that are now somewhat forgotten out of their overall discography other than by the devoted.

    The next single, Set Me Free, b/w I Need You, is much more up my alley. I think both songs are phenomenal. I only recently (in the last few years) discovered I Need You. Perhaps it’s nothing more than a knock off of You Really Got Me, but it’s a hell of a rock song with a great riff and a great guitar solo. ...and as far as I am concerned, The Kinks single handedly invented proto-punk, hard rock and heavy metal all in one fell swoop with YRGM, so if anyone should get to spew out a few derivative of it, it’s the gents who invented it. I loved it 20 years later when they get all derivative of YRGM yet again with Destroyer. Set Me Free is also fantastic, incredibly catchy with a chorus that gets stuck in your head. I give both of these songs very high marks.

    As far as See My Friends/Never Met a Girl Like You Before, I had never heard either song prior to today. I typically don’t care much for the droning Indiana raga thing, no matter who does it. My first listen through to See My Friends, I didn’t care for this one either. Second time paid dividends though, especially Dave’s solo at the end. Never Met a Girl is slight, but catchy and energetic enough to tack on to the end of a Kinks playlist. Definitely yet another poor man’s You Really Got Me derivative, but this time with a more jangly guitar. I ended up liking both with a few more plays, not top tier Kinks, but enjoyable enough that I would probably give them both Bs.
     
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  23. Safeway 2

    Safeway 2 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Manzanillo Mexico.
    See My Friends Has to be the first example of an Indian-influenced drone in rock history. Even if it doesn't have an actual sitar, the guitars sure sound like one. For sure one of the album's most original compositions. It has a Rubber Soul sound and feel to it, before Rubber Soul. A psychedelic chant. Amazing and beginning to sound ahead of their time.

    Never Met A Girl Like You Before
    Catchy, more developed than some of the early forays into this kind of R&R. Nice little TOWFY mashup at the beginning but not near as provoking as "See My Friends"
     
  24. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

  25. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

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