The Kinks - Album by Album (song by song)

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

  1. The late man

    The late man Forum Resident

    Location:
    France
    Watching the wheels is ok, I had forgotten it.

    But God, the awful production !
     
  2. The late man

    The late man Forum Resident

    Location:
    France
    Wow

    I'm beaten, in the "unpopular opinion" contest, forever. I quit. You are the Master for a reason!
     
  3. The late man

    The late man Forum Resident

    Location:
    France
    Bitter angry rants are what I expect from lennon, peace doesn't suit him imo
     
  4. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    lol
     
  5. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    Welcome To Sleazy Town.

    stereo mix, recorded Jun-Jul 1986 at Konk Studios, Hornsey, London

    One hand on the controller
    One hand on the re-wind
    You can even watch it all in slow mo'
    'Cos you just sit at home all day
    Now you got plenty of time

    If you want some real live action
    And the video's too tame
    If you wanna touch some heat
    But you don't know how to light that flame
    If you want some satisfaction
    Instead of studying the freeze frame

    I used to have this spot on Main Street
    It was bounding, it was hot
    It was dark, it was dirty
    But dull it was not
    The joint was jumping every night
    But now it's just a parking lot

    This city was cruel
    This city was keen
    This city was alive
    This city was mean

    Till the office blocks and parking lots
    Came and closed this city down
    I could stand outside
    The kids hung round
    And the neon sign said
    Welcome to Sleazy Town
    Welcome to Sleazy Town
    Sleazy, Sleazy Town

    Everybody hung loose
    It was cool and easy
    People used to meet and have a good time
    Down in Sleazy Town, Sleazy Town, Sleazy Town, Sleazy Town

    Then the corporations came along
    And bought this piece of ground
    The leases all went up
    And so the buildings all came down
    They built the motorways and shopping malls
    And they killed off Sleazy Town

    This city was cool
    This city was keen
    This city was alive
    This city was till the office blocks and parking lots
    Came and closed this city down
    I could stand outside, the kids hung round
    And the neon sign said
    Welcome to Sleazy Town
    Welcome to Sleazy Town, Sleazy, Sleazy Town
    City Hall killed off that scene
    Now Sleazy Town is just a dream

    Written by: Ray Davies
    Published by: Davray Music Ltd.

    I love this song...

    We sort of move into this song really smoothly, with an enjoyable blues/jazz club vibe.
    As we move along it gets more punchy, and we retain a blues feel, but it has more punch than the beautiful opening section.

    Lyrically this track sort of explores the homogenization of society to some degree.
    We open with the idea that people tend to sit in their homes with remote controls and watch the videos, rather than get in and amongst the world.... which from my perspective is all based around the idea that more and more over the decades, the idea of scaring people into staying at home seems to have been a thing, with constant reports of everything being too dangerous to leave the house....

    I think this verse sums it up to some degree
    "If you want some real live action
    And the video's too tame
    If you wanna touch some heat
    But you don't know how to light that flame
    If you want some satisfaction
    Instead of studying the freeze frame"

    These days, to some degree, the home video, which was the start of the home entertainment system mentality, has been usurped by the internet.... These days whether at home or out in public, it seems that pretty much everyone seems to be playing with their phones and living in some kind of alternate reality, rather than the place where they actually are... I'll admit I am just as guilty as everyone else... I mean we're on here discussing music...
    It seems like we have been shepherded into this corral where a digital world is more appealing than the one outside the bits and bytes.

    In some ways this song is somewhat of an echo of Here Come the People In Grey... we have the city being modified into the series of compartments for the perpetuation of the theme in the previous song, creating this predictable lifestyle of repetition. We rebuilt society to be a safe zone... but the offshoot is that it is sort of lifeless... The vibrant, glowing explosion of colour and life, has been substituted for the safe grey walls of the office, which is "just another factory", but with somewhat cleaner floors.

    Things don't have to be salacious to be entertaining, although that aspect of humanity will always be there.... clubs where people played music, had a few drinks, danced, lived lives, has been substituted for .... something else.

    In this context, I think Ray is using the term Sleazy town in a sort of ironic way or something. He is branding the idea the way the media has for decades... The idea that groups of people having fun somehow always equates to a negative experience. Instead we require you all to follow the path we have laid out for you. Sit in your home and be safe. Sit and watch the videos we have made to program your thoughts, that way we can keep you in a position and shape that is more comfortable for us to deal with .... no alarms and no surprises please.

    Again we seem to have this thematic album happening, and I'm only just noticing it.

    Work at the factory, in one of its many different guises.
    Lost and found comes in as a bit of humanity. Life is short, and we have no control over the big picture... so show your love everyday, because it could be your last.
    The dancing joy of repetition, that leads to reminiscing about the times when the world was full of life and people actually went out and did things rather than sitting in their home entertainment zones...
    and then tomorrow we sing the praises of the video shop, and the way it can control our viewing choices, in order to keep us in the house lol
    anyway......

    Musically this is a great track.
    We start off on Bourbon Street, and then roll into this punchy, rocking blues.... remember when we said the Kinks couldn't do blues... that's a long time ago now.

    When the "This City Was...' backing vocals come in, it sounds excellent.

    We get some great harmonica feeding the feel well, and Dave does some nice little lead licks.

    The main, walk up, chord progression has been used before, but I think the way it is used here works really well.
    After the short instrumental break, we get a really excellent double time jazz section, that is short and sweet.

    I love the way way sings "Welcome, welcome"

    For me this is another great track .... and listening now, I have to wonder what I was hearing when I first put this album on, because we're rolling 4 for 4, and a good quality four at that.

     
  6. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    Live in Offenbach Germany in 1989

     
  7. ajsmith

    ajsmith Senior Member

    Location:
    Glasgow
    Have to be the one to mention how the riff of this one ends up echoing that of Genesis's 'Misunderstanding' quite a bit:

     
  8. ajsmith

    ajsmith Senior Member

    Location:
    Glasgow
    Looking at the opening lyric, I wonder if maybe this track would have worked better coming directly after 'Video Shop' on the LP and closed out side one..

    Interestingly, 'Sleazy Town' endured as a live regular for the last decade of The Kinks performing career: I'm guessing this is likely because it was a chance to do an extended blues improv (as shown in the 1989 live clip Mark posted above) which the band enjoyed/helped pace the set rather than in response to a deluge of paper plates begging for this deep cut to be played landing on the stage. Would have been a bathroom break for me though I have to say!

    Have to admit I don't much like it when Ray starts doing this kind of '40/50s hipster jive speak/singing talk over loose bluesy/jazzy backing music ' kinda thang.. always seems a bit bogus and a self conscious tilt at 'refined cool' that misses the mark to me.. seemed to be a recurrent feature of the last 10 years of The Kinks and there will be worse examples coming up...

    I can imagine, had The Kinks had a Rolling Stones level budget, some kind of Ralph Bakski/John K 'Harlem Shuffle' style animated video being made for this in 1986, with a version of the Spiv character but as an anthropomorphised wolf with the inevitable 'eyes a popping outta his head' when he spots a sharp babe etc...
     
  9. ARL

    ARL Forum Resident

    Location:
    England
    "Welcome to Sleazy Town"

    I was aware of "Misunderstanding" by Genesis being a hit single in 1980. Earlier this year I listened to the Duke album for the first time ever. I don't think I ever heard "Misunderstanding" in the intervening 42 years, so by 1987 it had disappeared out of my mind. When I heard it this year, I was immediately thinking "I know that tune from somewhere..." but it took me a few minutes of mentally going through my collection to work out where it came from. Given that I've known "Sleazy Town" for more than half my life, that's what I associate that tune with.

    The three tracks so far have been pretty standard Kinks fare, but here we get something a bit different - a bit jazzier and maybe bluesier - and again it works very well. The slow beat creates the dirty atmosphere of Sleazy Town, slowly being lost due to the gentrification of the area - or maybe just the destruction of it to create more car parks for the consumer generation. However, the consumer generation is at home watching the latest VHS technology. It's another good song full of hooks and Ray gives another great performance. What's not to like? (That could have been the title of the album!)
     
  10. The late man

    The late man Forum Resident

    Location:
    France
    Usually Collins's compositions are so shapeless that virtually every music could be construed as a Collins rip-off in at least one of its parts. But Misunderstanding is the one exception to that rule, it's almost proggy, and has a very delineated, clever construction. And the similarities are very strong here. A coincidence is not to be totally ruled out, but even if Genesis wasn't as big in 1980 as it became in the following years, the single appears to have had some level of success (n°42 in the UK, n°1 in Canada, n°14 in the US). I'd say maybe the riff on the Genesis song has a more chordal harmonic role than on the Kinks song, where it acts more as a decorative run through a static harmony, but as I'm typing it I'm not even sure it makes any sense.

    I'm working on getting over this, because I love Sleazy Town. It's a great Kinks tune, the best on the album with tomorrow's song. These two demonstrate that Ray's creativity is not dead yet.
     
  11. Luckless Pedestrian

    Luckless Pedestrian Forum Resident

    Location:
    New Hampshire, USA
    I like how Sleazy Town takes its time and lets the story unfold at its own pace, and Ray’s choppy, half-sung, half-spoken vocals, laconic yet insistent, are fantastic, creating a solid center for the shifting moods in the music. The lyric “If you wanna touch some heat/But you don't know how to light that flame” is quite killer. Sounds great also, production wise. An album highlight for me.
     
  12. All Down The Line

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

    Location:
    Australia
    Is Ray's wife in this clip?
     
  13. DISKOJOE

    DISKOJOE Boredom That You Can Afford!

    Location:
    Salem, MA
    Pure brilliance on that one, Avid The late man, pure brilliance. Lennon had a lifelong problem trying to reconcile both of those tendencies.

    Anyway, last night I think I wandered into some kinda thread about Double Fantasy. I swore that I was on the Kinks thread, but I keep reading all this stuff about John and Paul and their merits of their solo albums. Jeez, it’s almost like every other thread in this forum :laugh: I’m only kidding, just yanking your chains, my fellow Avids.

    Anyway, getting back to the Kinks and Think Visual, the song for today is “Sleazy Town”.Remember yesterday’s comments about “Repetition” and how the consensus among us Avids was that it was an OK song that lacked something? To me “Sleazy Town” definitely has the character and the enthusiasm that the prior song lacked. It has stuck in my brain pan for the past thirty odd years, while I had to replay the prior song to jog my memory. The lyrics are also great, if now somewhat dated since shopping malls are now going the same route to oblivion these days.

    Finally, all you Avids are yammering about Genesis and “Misunderstanding”. From my first hearing of “Sleazy Town”, this is what I hear, James Brown’s “I Go Crazy”, this version from his famous Live at the Apollo from the year of my birth:

     
  14. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    Obviously I can hear the chord progression that has the Misunderstanding link folks are talking of.... but it isn't a big deal to me.... and for me the songs aren't really all that similar. So I'm not particularly perturbed about it really.
     
  15. pyrrhicvictory

    pyrrhicvictory Forum Resident

    Location:
    Manhattan
    Welcome to Sleazy Town

    A bluesy excursion with nary a scruple of soul, this song fared much better live, with Ray acting in character, and Dave’s extended guitar work. If Ray was attempting to write his ‘My City Was Gone’ though, then master lost out to student. My go-to memory of this song goes like this: There was an old-man bar located on the street right behind the Capitol Theater in Passaic, NJ, and I took refuge inside in order to escape the late-winter cold for an hour or so. I had been waiting at the stage door, at 4PM, as was my wont. All the Kinks arrived, minus Ray, who I was told was appearing on Live at Five in NYC. I sat at the bar, ordered a beer (yes, I was only 17, but this was Passaic), and sure enough, the television was turned on to NBC. Ray got himself into some hot water over his ‘sleazy town’ comment, which he then doubled down on. It didn’t seem to disturb the day-drinkers any, all heads remained bowed. As the interview ends, and the segue begins, Ray mumbles, almost inaudibly, ‘in my trousers,’ which gets a rise out of venerable news anchor Sue Simmons.




    BTW, wasn’t a fellow Avid looking to buy Think Visual on cd for a reasonable price. Looks like there’s one on EBay for $15 US.
     
  16. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    No idea mate. Sorry
     
  17. All Down The Line

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

    Location:
    Australia
    Could someone please post the Kinks studio version?
     
  18. ARL

    ARL Forum Resident

    Location:
    England
    Does this link work for you?
     
  19. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    So far as the actual chord pattern goes, it's the same as Owner Of A Lonely Heart too, just with a different rhythm accent... it's actually a fairly common scale run type pattern really
     
  20. markelis

    markelis Forum Resident

    Location:
    Miami Beach FL
    Welcome to Sleazy Town:

    Now this one is really something a bit different for the Kinks. I am a big fan of WtST. Other than here and there, they haven’t tackled the blues too often, especially with this kind of jazzy feel. Dave gets off some good solos, the barroom piano cooks and there are some great harmonica wails in the background. Funny lyrics and great singing. 4 for 4 for me.

    Also, until I read the lyrics, I was hearing:

    I used to have this spot on Main Street
    It was bounding, it was hot
    It was dark, it was dirty
    But dull it was not
    The joint was jumping every night
    And that was just the parking lot

    I am no Ray when it comes to writing songs, (to be clear, I am not a musician or songwriter and I have never even tried to write a song), but I like my line better! First time in covering 23 years of Kinkiness that I think I knew better than Ray!
     
  21. Zeki

    Zeki Forum Resident

    “A living legend in my face.”
    Ray: “In my trousers.”
    Shocked face.
     
  22. Fischman

    Fischman RockMonster, ClassicalMaster, and JazzMeister

    Location:
    New Mexico
    It was dark, it was dirty
    But dull it was not


    Welcome to Sleazy Town
    One of the great things about all those klassic Kinks albums is how they incorporated so many styles so often and really nailed most if not all of them. That diversity dropped off during the Arena Rock era.

    This is a most welcome return to that ability. And it is, to my ear, yet a new foray. Sure, they've done blues before, but never this particular brand of smoke-filled-barroom, seedy-side-of-town, jazzy blues.

    Now to be honest, Ray's voice doesn't always seem the best match for this style, but I still think he pulls it off quite well. The music captures that vibe exceptionally well, but it's not a pure aping of the style; it has a contemporary vibe to go with the older style an I find that blend most intriguing.

    4 songs in, I'm enjoying this album more than I remember.
     
  23. Steve62

    Steve62 Vinyl hunter

    Location:
    Murrumbateman
    Repetition
    For a simple song about a simple topic I like this one more than I thought I would. It has some great vocals and harmonies that remind me a bit of how the Pretenders did them.
    Welcome to Sleazy Town
    This starts off like an early Tom Waits jazz-style song then soon slips into a normal Kinks groove. Now that people are talking about it I hear a resemblance to Misunderstanding - but in the Venn Diagram of rock there would be no overlap at all between Genesis and the Kinks. I even doubt the members of either band have heard any of the other's music. So I'm going with the standard chord progression theory. The lyrics are suitably sleazy, though some elements (video/rewind) haven't aged well. Still, they've aged better than the video shop. :D
     
  24. All Down The Line

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

    Location:
    Australia
    Welcome To Sleazy Town

    I wrote the title then immediately got caught up with kids and bedtime and the like so an hour on just what was I going to write?

    This song is a good change of pace or more accurately of style.
    Dave particularly and the band are delivering but I can't decide on Raymond particularly after hearing the live version upthread.

    I had not heard that Genessis song before but the resemblance sure is uncanny when comparing closely.
    When Ray sings those lines about the City being cruel, keen and alive he paces his lines while the music pulses of it's own accord and it's this part that is driving me nuts figuring out what it reminds me of.
    I think it's a Kinks song with Ray singing with a slower pacing however I can't even narrow it down to either of the Pye, RCA or Arista period!
    That conundrum aside I do hear something that reminds me of a stately run in Hot Fun In The Summertime by Sly And The Family Stone but you may feel I've just been too long in the sun! :crazy:
     
  25. All Down The Line

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

    Location:
    Australia
    Some may wish there's was!
     
    DISKOJOE and mark winstanley like this.

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