The Kinks - Album by Album (song by song)

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

  1. croquetlawns

    croquetlawns Forum Resident

    Location:
    Scotland
    I'm just referring to the 60s albums (+ Lola) to not get too off-topic. I also like some of their later album art, eg. Sleepwalker, Muswell. But we can revisit this topic when we ruminate on the 70s albums!
     
  2. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    I don't think someone having gone to art school actually suggests they're any good art art.... plenty of folks go to regular school and struggle with reading, writing, mathematics etc.....

    Then again I'm not as perturbed by the album covers as most seem to be.

    Personally I like Kontroversy, Something Else, Village Green, Arthur, Muswell Hillbillies, Sleepwalker, Low Budget... I've never felt that there was anything particularly wrong with the band's album covers.
     
  3. Fortuleo

    Fortuleo Used to be a Forum Resident

    So it's the end of our "wrapping up the sixties" week. The most remarkable thing about the Kinks' output in those years is they indeed weren't like everybody else. We've often noted their reluctance to go the psychedelic route when it was fashionable. Ray's infamous Revolver "review" seems to indicate it was mainly due to the fact he considered he'd been there done that two years before the Beatles (and everyone else for that matter) with the not too successful See My Friends single. It's hard to fathom but in 66, he thought he was long passed that style and wanted everybody to know he was not looking back. The Kinks were cocky dudes in those days…

    So I took notes all through our discussions and, as I hate off-days on the thread, I thought I'd share a list of all the songs that any of us described as "psychedelic" in our posts, or having some psychedelic elements to them. All in all, we end up with the following list of only 15 songs (to be exact, Funny Face didn't get the psychedelic tag, but I believe it was because the many mentions of Itchycoo Park to describe the phasing vocals were clear enough). So here it is, folks, I proudly present you the (un)official song by song thread’s "Psyk Kinks" list. I've just tried it, and I can assure you it's a fascinating listen.

    There’s a New World Now Opening for Me
    See My Friends
    Rainy Day in June
    Fancy
    Funny Face
    Lazy Old Sun
    Autumn Almanac (stereo)
    Wonderboy
    Sitting by the Riverside
    Phenomenal Cat
    Wicked Annabella
    Lavender Hill
    I’m Crying
    King Kong
    Australia
     
  4. All Down The Line

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

    Location:
    Australia
    It does look fascinating but how didyou get that much time off?
     
  5. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    I think @Fortuleo is taking notes.
    He's going to give us report cards at the end of the thread :)
     
  6. joejo

    joejo Well-Known Member

    Location:
    toronto
    You play the first 4 or 6 or 8 songs on Golden Hour Of The Kinks, you don't need no stinking album covers.
     
  7. joejo

    joejo Well-Known Member

    Location:
    toronto
    Days
    Wonder Boy
    Autumn Almanac
    Waterloo Sunset
    Dedicated Follower
    Dead End Street
    Set Me Free
    Sunny Afternoon
     
  8. Zeki

    Zeki Forum Resident

    I thought you were on vacation, Mark!?
     
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  9. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    I am :)
    When you get up at 3:30 am every day, it's hard to suddenly learn how to sleep in lol
    I was going to do some painting, but I'm not feeling it this morning, and Steph isn't awake yet, so I'm chilling and listening to the ocean
     
  10. DISKOJOE

    DISKOJOE Boredom That You Can Afford!

    Location:
    Salem, MA
    Painting as in "art" or painting as in "fence"?
     
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  11. DISKOJOE

    DISKOJOE Boredom That You Can Afford!

    Location:
    Salem, MA
    Those are half decent covers, although I would prefer one of the Hampshire Heath piccys for VGPS.
     
  12. donstemple

    donstemple Member of the Club

    Location:
    Maplewood, NJ
    I think it was @Martyj who said they should have just switched the covers of Something Else and Village Green Preservation Society, and I don’t think I disagree.
     
  13. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    Art.
    I bought a set of paints last vacation, and enjoyed the oil painting.
    I'd want to get better before trying acrylics, but the four paintings I did last year turned out pretty good for a first try.
    With anything I do though, I have to be in the zone, so if I'm not, I do something else :)
     
  14. Zeki

    Zeki Forum Resident

    The badness (re: album covers) is still to come. Other than ‘Something Else.’ That fits ‘bad.’
     
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  15. jethrotoe

    jethrotoe Forum Resident

    Location:
    United States
    I do agree with you but I guess it was more that he should have been exposed to some concept of quality or could have had connections to artists. He might have wanted to be a painter, I don't remember, I know he wanted to be a filmmaker. I also know he draws/doodles.

    And I'd imagine he would have had to have taken some basic visual art/composition classes, or even art history and been exposed to art that way, regardless of his tract/medium.

    I think all those covers you mentioned are fine-to-cool, except Low Budget, which in my opinion looks like a Spinal Tap album cover.
     
    Last edited: Sep 19, 2021
  16. jethrotoe

    jethrotoe Forum Resident

    Location:
    United States
    "The Ocean"? Won't Bonzo's drums wake her up??? :laugh:
     
  17. jethrotoe

    jethrotoe Forum Resident

    Location:
    United States
    Little Women
    Situations Vacant
    Love Me Till the Sun Shines
     
  18. skisdlimit

    skisdlimit Forum Resident

    Location:
    Bellevue, WA
    :agree: I'm playing this "Psyk Kinks" right now, and as Mr. Spock would say, "Fascinating!"

    Five of those songs made my own 60's Kinks Top 25 list, with both "Funny Face" and "I'm Crying" being serious contenders. Going just by the numbers, my album rankings would be:

    U.K. albums
    Village Green - 4
    Face To Face - 3
    Kontroversy - 2
    Something Else - 2
    Kinda Kinks - 2
    Arthur - 1
    Kinks - 1

    Komps
    The Kinks Are Well Respected Men - 8 (7 of these are also from Spotlight On The Kinks which includes a few of the main album cuts too)
    The Great Lost Kinks Album - 1
    Hidden Treasures - 1

    Weird that I ended up with a 3-way tie for 3rd place, even if I would objectively rank both Kontroversy and Something Else (those two are basically neck-and-neck for me) above Kinda Kinks. Even more strange that Arthur placed so low, which I would at least rank above Kinda Kinks, but then "Shangri-La" is a comparatively lengthy song probably worth about two tracks from the one of the other titles, and Spotlight only included "Victoria" from that album anyway (I seriously considered leaving that one in as well) with nothing at all from Village Green (go figure!).

    As most of these lists demonstrate, you really need some kind of compilation to get those essential non-album tracks, provided you don't go the "deluxe edition" route. While Hidden Treasures is easy enough to obtain, the others are unfortunately OOP. I've seen a myriad of "Greatest Hits" type sets floating around, but will leave it for the more knowledgeable among us here to recommend the best ones currently out there. :)
     
    Last edited: Sep 19, 2021
  19. DISKOJOE

    DISKOJOE Boredom That You Can Afford!

    Location:
    Salem, MA
    Here's another World Radio History Kinks article dive, this time of the UK music paper that Paul McCartney once called the "enemy", the New Musical Express. First, here's the link to the paper in general, which contain links to all of the History of Rock magazine series that Uncut Magazine put out for the years 1965-88 & which contains Kinks articles from the NME & MM:

    NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS: UK Music Magazine started in 1952

    Now here's the articles:

    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...-12-S-OCR-IDX-2.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...R-OCR-Page-0016.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...14-S-OCR-IDX-13.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...09-13-OCR-IDX-6.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...05-31-OCR-IDX-6.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...05-21-OCR-IDX-6.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...R-OCR-Page-0007.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...-08-S-OCR-IDX-6.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...R-OCR-Page-0011.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...04-26-OCR-IDX-5.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...6-OCR-Page-0014.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...R-OCR-Page-0008.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...4-16-OCR-IDX-10.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/I...4-09-OCR-IDX-13.pdf#search="ray davies kinks"
    https://worldradiohistory.com/UK/New-Musical-Express/1965/New-Musical-Express-1965-04-09-OCR.pdf
    (Page 8)
    https://worldradiohistory.com/UK/New-Musical-Express/1965/New-Musical-Express-1965-04-02-OCR.pdf
    (Page 9)
    https://worldradiohistory.com/UK/New-Musical-Express/1965/New-Musical-Express-1965-03-26-OCR.pdf
    (Page 2)
     
  20. DISKOJOE

    DISKOJOE Boredom That You Can Afford!

    Location:
    Salem, MA
    A question for Avid Fortuleo which is somewhat on point. You live in France. Are you familiar w/Jacques Dutronc, the sorta, kinda husband of Francoise Hardy? Are you familiar w/his mid-late 1960s musical output? The reason why I ask is that I do have his early albums on CD & he was compared w/Ray Davies in his lyrics. Here's a sample:

     
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  21. bvb1123

    bvb1123 Rock and Roll Martian

    Location:
    Cincinnati Ohio
    Hey all! I'm back and all fixed up. Looks like a picked a great time to come back. So we're ranking the 60s Kinks' albums. Well here goes mine:
    Something Else By The Kinks
    The Village Green Preservation Society
    Face To Face
    Arthur
    The Kink Kontroversy
    The Kinks
    Kinka Kinks



     
  22. bvb1123

    bvb1123 Rock and Roll Martian

    Location:
    Cincinnati Ohio
    Ok, and a three CD greatest hits from 60s Kinks?
    Here's mine (chronological because I like it that way):
    Cd1:
    You Really Got Me
    Stop Your Sobbing
    All Day And All Of The Night
    Nothin' In This World Can Stop Me Worryin' 'Bout That Girl
    Tired Of Waiting
    Everybody's Gonna Be Happy
    Set Me Free
    Where Have All The Good Times Gone
    I'm Not Like Everybody Else
    Till The End Of The Day

    CD2:
    Party Line
    House In The Country
    Fancy
    Dead End Street
    Big Black Smoke
    I'll Remember
    David Watts
    Death Of A Clown
    Love Me Till The Sun Shines
    Lazy Old Sun
    Waterloo Sunset
    Susannah's Still Alive

    CD3:
    The Village Green Preservation Society
    Do You Remember Walter
    Picture Book
    Animal Farm
    Starstruck
    People Take Pictures Of Each Other
    Victoria
    Yes Sir, No Sir
    Drivin'
    Brainwashed
    Shangri-la
    She Bought A Hat Like Princess Marina
    Arthur
     
  23. FJFP

    FJFP Host for the 'Mixology' Mix Differences Podcast

    I will chime in with a more decent rundown from my perspective this week, but I want to say before the weekend is out: I love all the Kinks’ album covers on Pye. Kinda could maybe have used a better photo, but the layout is great. TKaVGPS is also better with the B&W Swedish cover, but I do enjoy the UK one a lot, and the colours are what I see in my head when I hear the album.
     
  24. jethrotoe

    jethrotoe Forum Resident

    Location:
    United States
    My Greatest Hits of the 60s (which I see as different from Best Of or Personal Favorites) would be as follows:

    Disc 1:

    You Really Got Me
    All Day And All of the Night
    Tired of Waiting For You
    Stop Your Sobbing
    Everybody’s Gonna Be Happy
    Come on Now
    I Need You
    Who’ll Be Next in Line
    Set Me Free
    See My Friend
    A Well Respected Man
    Where Have All the Good Times Gone
    Till the End of the Day
    Dedicated Follower of Fashion
    Dandy
    Sunny Afternoon

    Disc 2:

    I’m Not Like Everybody Else
    Dead End Street
    Mr. Pleasant
    David Watts
    Death of a Clown
    Waterloo Sunset
    Susannah’s Still Alive
    Autumn Almanac
    Wonderboy
    Days
    Village Green Preservation Society
    Picture Book
    Starstruck
    Plastic Man
    Victoria
    Shangri La
     
  25. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    Good to have you back mate.
    Glad you're all fixed up.
     

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