Summer's Gone This one has really grown on me. It took multiple listens though, as it seems most Kinks songs do. To really understand the lyrics, get Ray's inflections, the witty lines, the little musical embellishments, the backing vocals. There is some of that 60s magic in here. Those "dit... ditdit, dit... dit... dit dit" backing vocals are straight Sunflower-era Beach Boys (This Whole World), or perhaps Do It Again (not the Kinks or the Steely Dan one!). And regarding the Beach Boys, their final track on their final original studio album (2012) is a nostalgic song called... Summer's Gone. Complete with nostalgic lyrics that I might say could come out of Ray's mindset, complete with references to friends, yesterdays, and the changing seasons as a metaphor for life's journey: Summer's gone Summer's gone away Gone away with yesterday Old friends have gone They've gone their separate ways Our dreams hold on For those who still have more to say Summer's gone Gone like yesterday The nights grow cold It's time to go I'm thinking maybe I'll just stay Another summer gone Summer's gone It's finally sinking in One day begins Another ends I live them all and back again Summer's gone I'm gonna sit and watch the waves We laugh, we cry We live then die And dream about our yesterday Back to the Kinks' Summer's Gone, trying to backwards engineer this song, I see elements of Waterloo Sunset (looking through a window, with trash flowing by, instead of the dirty old river), Stormy Sky ("thinking it's summer, but there are only clouds in the sky"), Schooldays ("When I think about what we wasted, makes me sad, We never appreciated what we had" recalls "but we never appreciate the good times we have until it's too late"). And gosh, I just love the internal rhyme and delivery of "wasted, makes me"(!!). Then the phrase "Summer's gone" recalls another season-song about summer's end... Autumn Almanac! ("buttered currant buns can't compensate for lack of sun, because the summer's all gone"). But here, Ray uses the American pronunciation instead of the English/Cockney "Summer's all gorn!". The "brr...doo doo doo doo"s also remind me of the final "la la las" and "bop bop bop bop bop, whoa" of Autumn Almanac. This might be growing to be one of my top 10 Kinks songs of the 80s. Final thought... are we sure the lyrics in the chorus are "So alone"? I hear it as "So long...", which I think makes more sense (and is also the name of another 60s Kinks song!).
Summers Gone Lyric and rhyme are fine but the music doesn't really grab me and I can't escape the feeling that this was a weak commercial choice for a single by Ray. I do enjoy Dave's fills though perhaps I would be a bigger fan of this track if i appreciated Bruce and the Beach Boys but as one Avid just tellingly remarked for the Kinks, (their) summers gone.
Summer's Gone There's really nothing special about this song, at list by Kinks standards, but I'm liking it more today than I remember. I get some Stones vibe here. Didn't expect that and never noticed it before, but I could really imagine Keef hitting that riff and Mick singing the verses. Lyrically, I love that first verse with Looking in the gutter, watching the trash go flowing by. Immediately following Thinking about good things that I just threw away. Brilliant metaphor. Then you've got that brilliant parallel of the end of a romance taking summer with it and the inevitable departure of your other great love in life, your kids. Fantastic. Now that I think about it, this song is pretty special.... maybe my new side 2 fave actually.
I always thought the following was about her departure: Pretty much the entire album of the Ray-penned songs! But that's been me long creating a narrative that doesn't fit, particularly chronologically with the Return To Waterloo songs written pre-break up and as part of a film. I would think that during the production and sequencing the break-up could've influenced the sequencing and song choices to a degree but I was wrong that these final three songs were about Chrissie, so I'm just as much a simpleton in overthinking the album's song themes.
In a spirit of conversation (not confrontation), I really don’t want to know that much background. I’m interested in whether it strikes a chord with me, something more universal, whether it’s nostalgic, humorous or a character study. If I focus on a song snippet and sing it aloud, whether to the sky or while playfully turning to my wife (while warbling away), I’m not thinking of some Ray biographical segment. The song has to resonate with me.
I merely took the lyrics from Kindakinks.net .... I have altered a couple over the course of the thread, but have generally left them as is.
What's quite remarkable is that, on a thread full of Kinks obsessives, this is the only post so far which has drawn a connection between "Summer's Gone" and "End of the Season"! Must admit it had never occurred to me either.
Just occurred to me, another song with a similar theme released in 1984 is Don Henley’s The Boys of Summer. It also begins with a descending, three-note figure, coincidentally or not.
My Polish mother, who would be 93, used to make this, along with pierogi, much to my Italian father’s (who would also be 93) consternation. For a non-Italian, Mom sure made the best ziti, spaghetti, etc. I’ve ever tasted. What I would do for another plateful tonight. Where she learned to make sauce like that, we’ll never know, but Dad’s appetite was always satisfied. (best behavior, now @All Down The Line) To me the Polish offerings were an olfactory nightmare, one I couldn’t overcome. Nor could Dad, though my sister would devour both cuisines. What I really want to say, @DISKOJOE, is enjoy every golumpki, and have one for me (and give your mom a kiss).
Yea, beginnings and endings seem to feature through the katalog. Something Better Beginning - Kinda Kinks 65 may have kicked it off.... And even something like the Preservation albums have subtle themes of endings and beginnings.
Well, thank you very much Avid Pyrrhicvictory. It’s amazing to me that my mother and Marilyn Monroe were both born in 1926. My mother now has 3 grandchildren and 4 great grandchildren while MM is now dead for nearly 60 years.
Summers Gone: My first impression here was that this was just a rewarmed Stonesy rocker that might have made Low Budget or GTPWTW (which is not a bad thing, I love those albums, and I like Stonesy rockers, whether by the Stones or by their competitors or progeny). Once I focused in more on the lyrics though, this was elevated a bit. I like the idea, that he is looking back on a lost summer love (or the loss of a love named Summer?), but what really kicks it up a notch is the little mini vignette from the narrator's youth about the conversation in the car where as a kid he heard his mom telling his dad, “hey, don’t miss the fun here, summers are a unique experience to be savored and, before you know it, they are gone”. I mean don’t we all wish we could go back and recapture the feeling of summer vacation, or the feeling of a lost love. Some nice Stonesy sounding intertwining guitars. I am surprised to hear that Ray played all the guitars on this (and on Sold Me out). He was a fleet fingered guitarist in his own right it seems, something I did not realize until recently (i.e.: this thread). I always liked Tom Petty’s response when asked if he was a good guitarist and he said (paraphrasing), “I am a hell of a rhythm guitarist!”. That he was, and so is Ray. (Warning) Digression: Funnily enough, another parallel with TP&theH occurred to me this morning when I was reading Luckless Pedestrian and DiskoJoe's thoughts on Dave's short, but scorching solo on Guilty. Like Mike Campbell, Dave seems to be a guitarist with potentially a lot of untapped and unused styles and capabilities. Both Dave and Campbell are real guitar whizzes, but as Campbell has been quoted as saying, he styles the solo in support of and to compliment the song, I think Dave can be seen as doing the same. Guilty was a real ripper and I would love to have heard him "go for it" a little (or even a lot) longer, but 95% of the time his solos are concise and elevate the song without taking it over. As Campbell said, he is there to "serve" the song. I truly would not be surprised if Tom Petty and Mike Campbell adopted/appropriated that approach directly from the Kinks. They were clearly fans (I posted their cover of Gotta Move previously, which was really spot on!). Although they differed in one big way, as Mr. Petty was known to say, "don't bore us, get to the chorus", and often with Ray, you can't even determine which part of the lyrics IS the chorus (though I'd argue he seldom leaves the listener bored despite the amorphous chorus). I have tried the longer version and I like that as well, but here I am thinking I am satisfied with the shorter album version. I like this song enough to tack it on a playlist for this era, but I just can’t hear what you really get that is extra for that extra minute of play time. Seems this one Ray made a good choice to pare it down. The Kinks can maximize their pop sensibilities in nice 3+/- minute songs well, so in most cases they don’t seem to benefit from rambling on. Good Day, by comparison, I like enough that I want the extra psychedelic instrumentation and Dave’s little speedy ol’ school solo in the last minute of the extended version, so the longer version makes sense.
Didn’t know that about Petty but it’s similar to what Lennon said about his own guitar playing. “Well, it depends on what kind of guitarist. I’m OK, I’m not technically good, but I can make it f*cking howl and move. I was rhythm guitarist. It’s an important job. I can make a band drive.” (In interview with RS’s Jann Wenner).
“Missing Persons” – I haven’t heard or watched anything Return to Waterloo-related yet, so I’m not comparing this version to anything. I wonder if it would have been more effective if the arrangement had stayed simple and intimate rather than including the big buildup? But it's powerful nonetheless, and the lyrics – including the self-recrimination - are heartbreaking. 4/5 “Summer’s Gone” – Just for the Beach Boys “dit-dits” alone, how can I resist? Like Elvis Costello’s “The Other Side of Summer,” the cheery music belies the dark message underneath. I see others have already mentioned the Beach Boys’ “Summer’s Gone," and both songs end with thunder signaling the permanent end of sunny days. There is some great writing here, with really vivid images. Avid @fspringer nails this: Yes, it really strikes home, especially after losing my Mom last year. I love Ray’s desperate delivery on “summer’s GONE!!” The repetitive chord pattern risks overstaying its welcome, so I don't need an extended version. It may not quite reach classic status for me, but it’s an excellent song. 4/5 Since those data formats are now dying or dead, it seems you were actually a visionary!
Dave is playing some of the guitars on "Summer's Gone" from all accounts. Sorry if my post misled you on this @markelis. I was implying that even though he was here, Dave was under utilized on this track in my opinion.
Summer's Gone During my casual first listens to the album, I thought it was just a song about lost summers, but a closer listen and it becomes clearer that its about a lost relationship. I think Ray saves the key line for the end "I really lost it all when I lost you." But its not just a simple lost love song. It ties in to all kinds of regret about not appreciating things while they are happening, because, of course, "Nothing Lasts Forever," and, of course, the very affecting lyrics about not appreciating your family while they're young. It's a good thing that musically the song is upbeat and bouncy, or it would really be depressing, lol. I know others have mentioned The Boys of Summer, which has a similar theme. I just took a quick listen, and it's uncanny how similar the repeating three tone descending note intro is to the pattern that starts maybe 12 seconds into the Don Henley song.
Summer's Gone The album continues with another good song, although I'm not sure why it was deemed to be the sort of thing to release as a single (it wasn't released in the UK). My favourite section is the family in the car: "I was riding in the car with my mum and dad, He was drivin' the car, the kids were drivin' him mad. Dad looked at us, then he looked at his wife, He must have wondered where we all came from. And then mum said, "Dad, you know it won't last for long, Before you know it, Summer's gone." A quite poignant look at the passing of time. Along with the weather, another of Ray's favourite themes. It's a keeper, but for me, not a classic.
The two songs are rhythmically identical in the intro, 3 notes descending over the four beat bar: 3 beat note - 3 beat note - 2 beat note - repeat - which creates a kind of centrifugal force that wants to repeat itself over and over. The tones are different though, Boys of Summer is in a minor key, Summer's Gone in major, and they play different notes in the respective scales. Wiki tells me The Boys of Summer was released on October 26, 1984, while recording for Word Of Mouth concluded in September of 1984. I know Ray is a repeat offender in this respect but I think that lets him off the hook in this case. I think in a lot of situations like this, there is just something in the cultural air that multiple artists pick up on. The Boys Of Summer was a much more successful single though - no doubt, Henley's not interrupting the conventional 4-bar verse pattern helped . It also helps that Henley is a fantastic singer. I just gave it a listen for the first time in years, it's a slick production, much more synth/keyboard heavy than I recall, while Summer's Gone is guitar-heavy, and maybe sounded a bit out of date by this time.
Didn't Lou Reed Say something of the kind too? I think I remember an interview where he was asked, if God allowed you a second chance, what would you wish to be, and he said "rythm guitarist"
