Hot potatoes, I'm sure it was purely accidental you forgot to also mention the Stormy Sky chart recognition!
Perusing the TV a few minutes ago I noticed an upcoming program titled "Big Sky Girls!" Now obviously only through being a Kinky Avid I briefly thought of my boys whereby of course normal folk wouldn't blink an eye. It was only when I read the blurb describing the show did I even consider there could be a link as its all about a songwriting mentoring program! N.b. Being in remote areas of Australia there is the Big Sky connotation though I would like to think their is a Kinks fan behind the Kompetition!
Pye 1 -Waterloo Sunset - 1 2 - Days - 2 3 - Sunny Afternoon - 3 4 - Shangri La - 4 5 - Autumn Almanac - 5 6 - Victoria - 6 7 - Dead End Street - 7 8 - You Really Got Me - 8 9 - Lola - 9 10 - Village Green Preservation Society - 10 11 - All Day And All Of The Night - 12 12 - I’m Not Like Everybody Else - 13 13 - This Time Tomorrow - 14 14 - Do You Remember Walter - 15 15 - Picture Book - 17 16 - Strangers - 18 17 - Animal Farm - 19 18 - Village Green - 21 19 - Some Mother’s Son - 23 20 - David Watts - 25 RCA 1 - Celluloid Heroes - 11 2 - 20th Century Man - 16 3 - Sweet Lady Genevieve - 20 4 - Sitting In My Hotel - 22 5 - Oklahoma USA - 24 6 - No More Looking Back - 41 7 - The Hard Way - 47 8 - Supersonic Rocket Ship - 53 9 - Alcohol - 56 10 - Schooldays - 59 11 - Sitting In The Midday Sun - 62 12 - Holiday Romance - 64 13 - You Make It All Worthwhile - 72 14 - A Face In The Crowd - 81 15 - I’m In Disgrace - 82 16 - Muswell Hillbilly - 86 17 - Daylight - 88 18 - Where Are They Now? - 96 19 - Holiday - 98 20 - Hot Potatoes - 119 Arista 1 - Better Things - 28 2 - Misfits - 40 3 - Rock And Roll Fantasy - 42 4 - Living On A Thin Line - 43 5 - Don’t Forget To Dance - 45 6 - Do It Again - 48 7 - Come Dancing - 51 8 - Superman - 60 9 - Sleepwalker - 66 10 -Father Christmas - 78 11 - Destroyer - 80 12 - Low Budget - 87 13 - Juke Box Music - 92 14 - Heart Of Gold - 93 15 - Catch Me Now I’m Falling - 95 16 - Around The Dial - 102 17 - Live Life - 110 18 - Moving Pictures - 111 19 - Mr Big Man - 112 20 - Stormy Sky - 114 MCA/Columbia/London 1 - Scattered - 31 2 - Loony Balloon - 65 3 - Did Ya - 68 4 - Look Through Any Doorway - 89 5 - How Are You? - 94 6 - Still Searching - 101 7 - War Is Over - 121 8 - Now And Then - 124 9 - The Informer - 136 10 - Working At The Factory - 146 11 - Lost And Found - 147 12 - When You Were A Child - 150 13 - The Road - 161 14 - Animal - 165 15 - Wall Of Fire - 173 16 - The Video Shop - 185 17 - Only A Dream - 188 18 - Think Visual - 192 19 - How Do I Get Close? - 208 20 - To The Bone - 210
Thread Guide 1963 - Nov 2023 + top 40 countdown Soap Opera tour, Preservation section The complete 263 from the top 40 77 onward top 20 - poll 1 RCA top 20 - poll 1 unreleased tracks top 20 - poll 1 7 songs voted at 1 missed top 40 songs with no votes Live At Granada TV 1978 Black Messiah single mix AJ's podcast - pt2 - pt3 - pt4 - pt5 - pt6 Countdown Part 2 100/98/98 97/96 95/94 93/92 This Is Where I Belong stereo 91/90 Marina Oz mono 88/88 87/86 Muswell Hillbillies remix 82/82/82/82 81/80 79/78 77/75/75 74/73 72/71 70/69 Brainwashed alt 68/67 66/64/64 Looney Balloon live 63 60/60/60 Sitting In The Midday Sun 76mix 59/58 57/56 55/54 53/52 Lazy Old Sun alt 51/50 49/48 47/46 45/44 42/42 41 The Group 100 with stats The Pye chart - Graph(ics) Alt 100 single vote songs pt1 - pt2 the 100 w/ points and votes the 263 the 317 songs with no votes The Era Charts - with top 100 position Record Mirror article ------------------ Dogs D'Amour Barrence Whitfield Robbin Thompson Scott McCaughey/ The Minus 5 Tom Rapp/Pearls Before Swine Ren Nils Lofgren Michael Head/Shack Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
This division in eras is much less artificial than one would think. There's a consistency to every era's style and mood that I find interesting. The four lists would be excellent compendiums and introductions to what those years were about. Great playlists, too! A few observations: - The Pye era Top 20 is (logically) the one where a few huge songs/hits are missing (Tired of Waiting, See My Friends, Till the End of the Day, to name just a few of the early klassiks). - Diminishing returns : all the Pye tracks are in our top 100. All but one of the RCA songs. 15 of the Arista tunes. Only the first 5 of the last list made it. - Shouty Ray is seldom heard. Same for warble Ray. - Despite their reputation as "unloved by the Thread", Sleepwalker (5 songs) and Low Budget (4) get the bulk of the Arista years. - Shocker : Think Visual places 6 tracks in the last list ! Phobia 5 and UK Jive 4 (but How Do I Get Close is in, @CheshireCat can rest easy!) and of course (despite @Mark's good will mistake this morning): - Preservation Act 2 is still conspicuous by its absence…
I guess the main thing I got from the Eras lists. - Pye clearly dominates - the differences in RCA and Arista are negligible - post-Arista struggles overall, in spite of plenty of great songs.
Yea, when I checked my other charts Money and Corruption was correctly labelled, not sure what happened here. Pres. Act 2 was pretty well represented in my lists, but clearly not in the group list.... but I think a lot of factors play into that. - probably the tightest concept/narrative driven album the band released - clearly everyone preferred different songs - although somewhat rehabilitated on the thread, still not a fan favourite... and I think that is due to the themes to some degree, and that seems to impact the perception of individual songs. Yea, certainly the two vocal deliveries that create the most division. Shouty Ray is mainly in the Arista years, and clearly effected that eras representation.
I’m gonna slip this in on yet another sunny day before the formal Freeform Sunday kicks in. My 1970’s AM radio playlist. Like my 60s list that covers 6 years (with maybe 2-3 exceptions), this one, too, goes from 1970- 1975; six years (though I think only one or two that tread in ‘75 territory). (After this my world becomes FM radio.) Growing Up on 70s AM Radio by Zeki on Apple Music
Good playlists! This would be a good one to listen to today with the sun shining through the windows. "Spirit In The Sky" is a perfect recording. I'm not religious at all, but I always thought the lyrics were being sarcastic. I think it's a bit of both. I read an interview where he said he thought it would be easy to write a song with Gospel lyrics. It's near the top of my list as one of the best recordings of all time. I love the production and the guitar sound. I first became aware of the song with the cover by Doctor and The Medics. It's nowhere near as good as the original, but I love the rest of that Doctor and The Medics record. It doesn't seem to get any respect, but I still play it regularly. I briefly thought about featuring it on my Sunday recommendation, but Laughing At The Pieces is really the only album by them that I think is great. They have a few good songs on the previous album and the follow up album, but I think most people regard them as a novelty/joke band.
@Zeki also has a great Paul Simon song on his playlist. I just watched this last night and thought it was a fantastic interview for anyone that cares about Paul Simon. I know @Fortuleo will find it interesting! We were both on the Paul Simon song by song thread a few months ago. He also plays a song from his newest album Seven Psalms on another clip and he sounded very impressive.
I agree. They could put these out as a compilation box set. It's amazing how concise and perfect all of these eras flow together. I also loved watching the Nigel Tufnel video that @Steve62 posted yesterday. Christopher Guest is brilliantly funny! Isn't there supposed to be a new Spinal Tap movie?
So I have spotify premium for a free two month trial. Thought I’d download Picture Book for the tracks I don’t otherwise have. And most, if not all of them, are greyed out. Unavailable. Bummer. A rights issue I am guessing.
Thanks! Like the 60s I've saved your playlist. While it's moving away from your title, I'm going to replace some of the 60s songs with at least 20 that missed out (either they weren't played on US radio or weren't big enough hits) like Hey Joe, All Along the Watchtower (Hendrix), The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore (Walker Brothers),The First Cut is the Deepest (PP Arnold), Out of Time (Chris Farlowe), To Sir With Love (Lulu), Itchycoo Park, Tin Soldier (Small Faces), Friday on My Mind, Sorry (Easybeats), I Only Want to be With You (Dusty Springfield), For Your Love (Yardbirds), Gloria (Them), A Whiter Shade of Pale, San Francisco, Monday Monday, etc. And I'll definitely make sure The Kinks have at least as many songs as The Monkeys or the Quarrymen! Steve's Ultimate Sixties Baby Boomer Mega List (TM). I'll do the same for the 70s list e.g. as much as I love dogs, there is no way a dog named Boo will play under my roof.
My AM radio is predominantly my memory of what played on Far East Network (FEN) (now called Armed Forces Network (AFN)). The two school years exception is 66-67 and 72-73 when I was in the US. Note: I ‘tentatively’ added Dusty Springfield. ‘Tentatively,’ because I’ll have to see what I can cut! Haven’t looked yet. Further note: The ‘dog’ stays! Final note: I shared this with childhood friend. He just texted, “FEN!” Addendum to first Note: Nope…can’t find anything to delete on the ‘60s list. (Maybe wiggle room on the ‘70s list).
OK so finally I am commenting on what did not make the consensus Top 80/100. Each of us has our own opinion as to how surprised we are that such and such song did not make it. My turn, and I’ll go in order of least surprised it missed to most surprised with the final one being not only surprising but out-friggin-rageous . Keep in mind the way I am listing these is not in any order from my own lists or rankings but by how I may have guessed and interpreted this group of folks to have voted. 1. War Is Over – overall rank 121 – my rank #23 in my second list - Had this later 1989 UK Jive song been more well known it would (hopefully?) have ranked much higher as it is a well written, constructed (and yes, produced) composition and recording. It actually harkens back to that early Kinks sound in terms of style and arrangement, but since it was 1989 and on an album that is not streaming and no one but apparently me, @CheshireCat, and @StefanWq rate, it got very few votes. I will paraphrase a recent post where they said they did not remember such and such song and that’s it in a nutshell when it comes to the late era Kinks. Some have suggested that the later songs did not rank any higher due to the votes being spread out over a large group of individual songs with fewer consensus standouts. While I do agree with this to some extent, that is not the whole story. In many cases, unfamiliarity with the later material contributed to this too, especially if one was using the Ranking Engine. In these cases, the familiar song title will always win out over the unfamiliar song title, whether you remember or know either of the actual songs or recordings being paired at all. Bummer this song and this album (UnKnown Jive) are getting lost to time. 2. Still Searching – overall rank 101 – this ranked #29 in my first Top 40 list and carried over to #12 in my second list – and at consensus 101 just on the cusp, but no dice. To me this is an outstanding latter-day composition and recording and I remember outlining most of this at the time we were going through the album. @All Down The Line and I discussed this during our fantastic phone call as being one of our favorites and Ray clearly has an affection for this one too as he had included it on some later career retrospective albums. The chords during the bridge (and the intro) are the secret sauce to this one for me, in addition to the lyrics. We all know Ray has been searching for something, anything, everything, for all of his life and career. The suggestion here is that the search is infinite and never ending. He will always be searching for something that will never be found and actually cannot be found as that as an end does not exist, nor does he want it to exist. The search itself is what is important and the fact it is unending and never resolved or realized is the actual goal and place that provides whatever the definition of peace of mind is for him. 3. Johnny Thunder – overall rank 190 – I did not actually rank this in either of my lists so I am right with the consensus on that front, but I surely thought that being a Village Green track and a well-known and important early-on-that-album song to that story, this would get called out and ranked by the group despite me not ranking it. Despite it being on an (in retrospect) iconic album and it having an (in retrospect) iconic guitar chord progression riff, it turns out Johnny Thunder is not one of the survivors of our Top 80/100 and it wasn’t even close. 4. Mr. Pleasant – overall rank 130 – and even though I did not personally rank this one either, I do recognize this as a great and important song in the grand Kinks of things and I (wrongly) assumed it would easily crack the Top 80/100. Given some of the ones that did, it’s very surprising to me it didn’t, but then again, I left it out myself so maybe others did for the same reasons, and we ended up outsmarting ourselves here which would be a very unpleasant reason if true. 5. Australia – overall rank 107 – this ranked #3 in my original Top 40 list and #2 in my second list. So… this is my biggest surprise and bummer of the countdown as to how this did not rank any higher than it did. This song has all (and I mean ALL!) the Ray hallmarks of not only the era but of his entire career in every aspect – clever but deep insightful lyrics set to catchy but clever music - irony, satire, deep character sketches, observational humor, different voice affectations, pastiche, etc. The entire band are playing outstandingly, multiple sections that change and evolve. I can go on and on... These same things are the very same things that get called out and praised in the songs that did get ranked with Ray and the band getting lauded for over and over again. So why the unlove for Australia? I can only surmise this song was ignored due to the long instrumental coda which may overshadow and cloud the perceptions on this song. It is unique for The Kinks, true, and I hear and picture that long outro as the boat voyage somewhere in the outback of the Indian Ocean. Had this song faded as the instrumental coda began it would have ranked consensus Top 20 no doubt in my mind. Then had the full recording with the instrumental outro been released decades later as a so-called “previously unreleased extended version”, everyone here would be saying how cool this is and why didn’t they release it like that in the first place? We’d be singing a different tune on this one I bet. Oh well, this is my way of actually sneaking in one more new alternate mix and sure enough it is that “previously unreleased extended version” that actually did turn up on a box set decades later. This is Australia (Alternate Mono Acetate Mix) and is even longer than before, and on both ends. Interesting mix for a couple of reasons as you’ll hear if you play it. The horns and the piano are more prominent and the vocalizations during the instrumental outro are completely different and weirder. Listen at 6:23 in this particular mix when the sax briefly quotes the Brainwashed verse melody (this is in all mixes) and then there is a Ray scream not heard in any of the other mixes and there are other weird chant-like voices all through this late section. I may prefer this mono mix to the original mono mix and since it came from an acetate, we’re lucky this survived at all. This was released on the 2019 Arthur SDE box set, was not on YouTube and is new to the thread. I didn’t post it during that box set’s discussion as we had two new stereo mixes of Australia to go through and I thought it might be overkill to post yet another mix of this song at the time, so I’ve been sitting on this one for a while ready to post when it showed up in the countdown in the Top 40 where I was confident it would take its rightful place. So I waited . And waited . And waited . And then it didn’t show up. And then it didn’t show up in the Top 80/100 either. Sheesh. Australia (Alternate Mono Acetate Mix) (I wanted to get this in before Freefall Sunday .)
I agree. This was a song I thought for sure would have no problem making the top 100. I should have ranked it higher. It was #36 on my second list.
It certainly should have made my second list. I suspect I was trying to be more…inclusive! And ‘Australia’ became a casualty. It’s a very clever song and is on my Pye playlist (following ‘Mr. Churchill Says’).
I hear the clearer horns and piano. And clearer gurgling noises at the end. Another difference is that the original ends with Ray’s voice saying “no class distinction” but I do not hear that on this mix.
Yep. That’s what I was talking about with the vocalizations being completely different here than all other mixes. This acetate mono mix is more than likely an early rough mono mix and the chanting and screaming heard during that outro here in this mix were later replaced by the vocals you mention for the later final mixes, the dreamy “Australiahhh, no class distinction, no drug addiction” lines that were not yet recorded as of this rough mix.
