You might be surprised how un-genteel the main character in the show was! The trailer for the film should give you a flavour: Ray claimed that Warren Mitchell, the actor who played Alf Garnett told him that the theme he’d written was too good for the film! Ray commented that he suspected they’d wanted more of a cockney knees up but he gave them something more reflective: a similar mismatch would replay over a full album with the Percy movie 3 years later.
It seems that Alf Garnett had a bit more life in him than Archie Bunker. I think I recognize one of the pepper pots from Help! (the two old ladies that wave at the Beatles in the beginning) in the trailer.
Lavender Hill I'm a bit surprised by the lukewarm reception to this song. Out of all the bonus tracks, I would choose this as the first song to make the cut for the album. It sounds the most like a piece of The Village Green. We have a beautiful melody and a few splashes of 1968 throughout with the wah-wah and the mellotron. It's interesting to think that it was Ray's response to "Strawberry Fields Forever". This could also be why I love it so much as I think that is one of the greatest recordings of all time. "Wish I could live on sugar and milk". This is a sweet song and I absolutely love it. Like "Waterloo Sunset" and his other songs about a particular place, "Lavender Hill" is another that I feel is successful in instantly transporting you right there with Ray. It's a very picturesque song just like many others on The Village Green Preservation Society which is why I think it would work so well on the album.. I made a playlist with some of the extra songs from the album and tried to rearrange some of the songs. It didn't work. It's too hard to mess with the running order of such a classic album. The bonus tunes would have to all be placed after the original album.
That would be impossible Mark. Battersea Power Station was built slowly from 1929 to 1941. Your image is from 1848.
Lavender Hill had a nice vibe when I was there in the 80's to attend a friend's wedding. The song itself has all the elements of Ray's peak 60s pop melodicism without the rock critic 'baggage' of tracks like "Waterloo Sunset" or "Sunny Afternoon". Taken on its own merits it's classic Swinging London Kinks and slots in well with the rest of that era for me. Puzzled by all the naysayers here...I hear no obvious bandwagon-jumping or lack of ideas.
I'm finding the Strawberry Fields comparison odd .... I understand it may have triggered the idea, or whatever, but I don't hear any real similarities
I'm glad I'm not the only person who had that immediate reaction upon hearing it for the first time (all those decades ago). I vividly recall instantly recognizing that the line: And Watch The Clouds Roll Over Me had a very similar melody to: 'Cause I Love To Live So Pleasantly As people have already observed, the whole tune is kind of like listening to Sunny Afternoon's melody set to Waterloo Sunset's meter, but to me, there are enough differences here to make it a really good song in it's own right. It dates from the same period that Paul McCartney concocted "Step Inside Love" for Cilla Black, and it's too bad that it didn't occur to Ray at the time, that this could potentially have been a big hit for someone else. I can easily imagine say, Scott Walker crooning it. I'm usually not that concerned with lyrics, but there is one in this tune that could easily have been replaced by something better: Wish I could live on sugar and milk Ew, that does not sound very appetizing. Two items commonly put into coffee, only without the coffee. I don't know if that was supposed to be some sort of substitute for something more obvious like say, "Honey and Wine," but there are probably hundreds of other consumable goods he could've inserted into that phrase that would've been an improvement. However, I do like the chord structure there, and am glad he decided to reprise it for the song's instrumental break. The song's main "I Want To Walk You Up Lavender Hill" melody is very infectious, and when he sings the title, in my head I'm partially hearing "Porcupine Pie," although I seriously doubt Neil Diamond would've been exposed to this.
It is interesting.... I don't know if it is an English thing, or a my family thing.... but... When we were young we would often have boiled milk before bed. When you boil milk it loses a little of it's natural flavour, so we would add a little sugar. I could still do that, and on occasion do. It seems to have a mild relaxant effect, believe it or not. Anyway, just a thought
Yes, a state of mind, that was it. In fact the first few lines in the song hints at that. I don't think Ray ever wrote a song about a location south of the river. Okay, Waterloo Sunset is just south of the river but it's not considered south London and when you add up all the songs he wrote about places north of the Thames, well I rest my case. As a songwriter this was a golden period for Davies. Andy Miller reckons he wrote something like twenty songs in the spring of 1968. As well as the two film scores already mentioned, the At The Eleventh Hour tv music, he also wrote the music for the film Virgin Soldiers.
Well the original is a 12 track version. But yes, as it stands VGPS is the greatest album of all time. You may be presumptive in thinking people wish for a double. When I consider it (and still nobody acknowledge the existence of the thread on this very topic which seems to have disappeared), it is more along the lines of what might he have been thinking (re a 20 track album). So in the end we have, he thinks he would like to do a double, it becomes a double of sorts (VGPS Europe and FMRG), and evolves into this perfect 15 track TGAOATBTK. How could it not be, given this timeline.
I agree. After careful consideration I have decided to leave TKATVGPS as it is. However, all those extra tracks will find their way on to my own personal GLKA. Two reasons for making this decision. 1. When Davies released Village Green it was his statement, his vision, and his decision to release the tracks on the album and in that particular sequence. As a fan I have to respect that decision. Also, I want to remember this album as I first heard it all those years ago. If I start messing with the running order and adding tracks now I will find it jarring. Some things are best left alone. 2. The GLKA was a record I bought as soon as I saw it in the record shop. I bought it on vinyl first and later bought it on cassette. Like most Kinks fans I have a soft spot for this record simply because it opened the door to so many hidden gems and the fact that it was withdrawn so quickly adds to the mystique. Many of the tracks were unavailable for years. Every single Kinks record I own has now been ripped apart from GLKA which, obviously, is not on cd. So I am going to make a playlist based around this album, omitting a few tracks but adding many more. And, as GLKA was a compilation with no input from Davies, by adding and omitting tracks, I feel I am not altering the artist's vision. Hopefully, I won't have changed my mind by tomorrow!!
For many who aren't serious 60s music specialists, the mere presence of a Mellotron triggers 'lazy' Strawberry Fields comparisons.
My mom used to give me warm milk with a dollop of vanilla extract and sugar when I couldn't sleep. Forgot that for 50 years till this moment.
The "Strawberry Fields" comparisons on this thread started from this comment by @ajsmith I have never heard this before, but listening this morning there are some minor similarities. A song about a "Lavender Hill" and a song about "Strawberry Fields", the opening mellotron sound, and a slight Ringoesque drum part. There are also many other 60s songs that share these similarities. It's certainly more than just the presence of the mellotron, because there have already been several Kinks songs that use it.
I think there’s a little more to it than just the mellotron. They are both richly potent evocations of dream like idylls conveyed through unconventional, tentatively exploratory pop structures. Also ‘Lavender Hill For Me’ as a closing refrain could be argued to contain a faint echo of ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’.
Never had any (that I remember at least, probably as a bub) but my hippy friend, who was about twenty years older than me, offered me some as a teen.... I was embarrassed, I didn't know it could be expressed lol
Now I am not so sure about the similarities to "Penny Land". In fact, I don't think I ever heard that song.
Lavender Hill A good song, but it is not as memorable as many of the other songs for THE GREAT LOST KINKS ALBUM. It's average Kinks so that means good compared to the general musical acts of the era, but not a standout. (3/5)
That sounds like the standard Summer of '67 playbook for everybody from Jan & Dean to The Hollies to The Tages to me. I bought The Great Lost Kinks Album in '73 and never...not even once...did I ever think of Strawberry Fields Forever and Lavender Hill as being somehow musically related other than both being fine examples of high-creativity 1967 British pop. I don't believe that Ray was writing "parodies" of other contemporary U.K. hits of the time at this point in his career. That was actually more of the kind of thing that one expected of The Beatles themselves. Cheeky monkeys.