As a Kinks fan for over 40 yrs., let me tell you guys that both Ray & Dave have done quite well for themselves. As my friend & fellow Kinks fan Jimmy would say, neither one of them has to do a day job since 1964. Do I wish that albums like VGPS or Arthur were big hits or we can hear "Waterloo Sunset" or "Days" on oldies stations all the time in the States after hitting #1? Of course, but they did accomplish a lot, despite the fact that there has been times of self-sabotage, especially after the '65 US tour & other points later on. Despite all the problems the Kinks went through their career, legal or otherwise, they did manage to have a long career, as well as the respect of their fellow musicians. Mark, it's just like Elvis' career in that well maybe he should have done some things differently, but look what he did do & he did a lot. It's also great to have this thread & to discuss the Kinks w/my fellow Avids who also appreciate them.
Mick Avory recently said that Ray never wanted to get too popular and would deliberately sabotage The Kinks to ensure it didn't happen. He wasn't being accusatory or critical of Ray. I just think that even beyond the Union ban (which was apparently caused by Ray too) they only got as popular as they (or at least Ray) wanted to be. That being said, over the last 15 years-20 years, obscure Kinks deep album tracks have been popping up left and right in media (TV shows and commercials, probably most famously in Wes Anderson's stuff and in The Sopranos), so many of their songs are having a weird sort of second life as near hits now. The most recent one I can think of is "This Strange Effect," which was used in a commercial fairly recently (a newly recorded cover version though). "Stranger" is probably the most notable example of this, used in Darjeeling Limited and then more recently covered by The Black Pumas (I think that's their name) for a Super Bowl ad. I guess you cannot hide a good thing from people forever.
Yes Sir, No Sir A great song. But the subject matter can make it a tough listen. My maternal grandfather fought in the First Word War and one of my great regrets was that I was too young to ask him about it. Of course, he may not have wanted to talk about it but.... One of my previous jobs was working in the GRO (General Register Office) in London. We kept records of all births, deaths and marriages for England and Wales going back to 1837. Coincidentally, this was the beginning of the reign of Queen Victoria, as Mark previously pointed out. Anyway, as well as keeping all these records, we also kept records of births, deaths and marriages for those serving overseas in all branches of the military. Seeing all the First World War deaths was an eye opener I can tell you. I know we occasionally hear the statistics but when you see the thick black volumes lined up in front of you, on all those shelves, it really does bring home to you just how many young men made the ultimate sacrifice. You pick a book at random and read some details - date of death, name, age, rank and service no, cause and place of death etc, harrowing stuff especially when you look down the age columns and see just how young these men were. Now when I listen to Yes Sir, No Sir I think of all those dusty books, lying on a shelf somewhere, where the details of those young men will remain long after memories of them cease to be.
That must have been an interesting job. How many of these books exist for the WWI period? Hundreds or thousands? Was the information entered by longhand or typed? As I have commented before, it seems that WWI has an emotional resonance in the UK & Australia that we don't have here in the US, probably because our involvement only lasted around a year and a half.
I have a different interpretation. In Yes Sir, No Sir the soldier is expressing that he would rather be dead than continue living in his current oppressive situation. Later he has finally found some peace, but at that moment everything is taken away in an instant.
WWI almost ended UK and Aus relations after the Gallipoli incident.... I doubt that many Aussies have forgotten that, still.
I’m 80% through my book and the U.S. hasn’t fought a battle yet. The European armies have already finished slaughtering each other. It’s nearing the end of March 1918 (where I am now in my book).
That is what I was thinking about, how the Brits (including Churchill) botched up Gallipoli & wasted the efforts of the Aussie troops. I know that in WW II, the Brits took the Aussie forces to North Africa & had the US basically defend Australia. The US entered WWI in April 1917 & I think they were involved in the fighting by that summer at the latest. Also, the Treaty of Brest Litovsk was around March 1918, allowing the Germans to pull out of the Eastern Front & transfer troops & material to the Western Front for one last push to Paris.
No sooner did I write the above and I read (and it’s now the end of April) that Americans are arriving in sizable numbers. But I just read this (that I’ll take the liberty of posting just as an idea of the scale of the horror): “Making them (the American troops) available had been a stupendous challenge. In 1916 the U.S. Army was smaller than the number of British casualties in the Battle of the Somme, smaller than the French or German losses at Verdun. It had so few senior officers that, after the American declaration of war, the volunteers and draftees were organized into divisions of twenty-seven thousand men each—nearly twice the size of European divisions, so that only half as many commanders and staffs were required.” From An World Undone; chapter 34.
Some military deaths were typed, others hand wtitten. The books were massive - it took two hands to pick one of them off the shelf. In alphabetical order by year and surname. I think there would have been 25 entries on each page but cannot say exactly how many books in total. Also had seperate books for naval deaths, marine deaths. Then there was the Second World War records, Boer War, deaths throughout the Empire. Marine births/deaths on civilian ships on their way to the New World. Births and deaths on the transportation ships to Australia. Deaths on British registered civilian aircraft, fishing vessel or just about any event that happened overseas, including civilian births, deaths and marriages to British Nationals registered at British Consuls and High Commission. Regimental Registers recording deaths all over going back to the seventeenth century. So a lot of interesting stuff there. In the pop world Freddy Mercury's birth registration was one of those we would show to any visiting VIP's, and of course, Cliff Richard. Spike Milligan would write in often bemoaning the fact we couldn't issue him with his birth certificate. He was born in India, father in British Army, but his birth was never registered for whatever reason. Keeping all these books in reasonable shape meant we had to have our own binding dept and now when I think about how some people treated these books I shudder. All been digitised now.
That was what Germany was dreading, the fact that the US could bring in fresh troops & resources to the Western Front to finally overcome the stalemate, thus the Brest Litovsk w/the new USSR
First major engagement for American troops is Château-Thierry. Late spring 1918. US declared war, as you said in 1917, but spent a year in training and preparation.
I heard that Spike Milligan had to get Irish citizenship despite the fact that his father was in the British Army & actually complained to Prince Charles about it. Did (does) the public have access to these materials? It seems like a treasure trove for someone into genealogy. In between having body parts replaced/worked on, I work part time as a reference librarian here in Salem, MA & we receive many inquiries & have people come to research their family tree, especially the Colonial/Witch Trial Eras.
Nice to see someone remembers the Boer War.... that caused some UK and Aus tension too lol Completely off topic, but I enjoyed Spike's war books.
Australians haven’t forgotten Gallipoli because it’s become our de facto national day - but the history has become muddied over time. Most Australians would be forgiven for believing only Australians and New Zealanders fought there against the Turks - that’s the popular view. Yet more French soldiers died in Gallipoli than Australians. And there were over twice as many British and Irish casualties than ANZAC ones. It was a strategic cock-up of equal opportunity that killed a lot of men from all around the world - over 1,000 Indians died there FFS. At the time it didn’t affect Australia’s relations with Britain: the evacuees from Gallipoli were fighting in the trenches of the Western Front a few months later. When we look at historical events through our 21st century values we risk missing the context of the times. Australian writer Les Carlyon in his amazing book on the Gallipoli campaign explains this far better than I can: “The past is easier understood when judged by the canons of its time. No- one in the Australian winter of 1914 envisaged casualties of 215,000. No-one in Britain, Australia or New Zealand envisioned the suicide of nations. For another thing, Australians saw themselves as transplanted Britons. A war against England was a war against them.”
I knew nothing of Gallipoli until I saw the Mel Gibson movie. Gawd, what a cluster****. It was simultaneously both maddening and heartwrenching to watch. I'd already studied a good number of historical military blunders brought about by intractible and inflexible "leadership," but that one seemed to be a new low.
No argument from me there. The histories always get shaded. This talk got me looking at some statistics, and it was surprising how many Indians were there, for me at least.
It’s a surprise isn’t it. Then again it was a case of Britain drawing on its empire. The Viceroy of India responded to Britain’s call for men by advising ‘the rulers of the Native States, numbering nearly 700 in all, have offered their personal services and the resources of their States for the war’. What I find even more tragic is the huge number of Africans who died fighting for Britain, France and Germany on the Western Front - drawn from their colonies in Africa. Eg France recruited more Africans than any other colonial power, sending 450,000 men from West and North Africa to fight in Europe. In a war of tragedies I feel especially sorry for those poor buggers.
I know. Well, if you have several songs about WWI & its impact on people that are well written by Ray, you can't help but talk about it. Also, I discovered that my library has that book you're reading, so I think I'll read it pretty soon.
SOME MOTHER'S SON "The world outside has great confidence in their men but I often wonder if they realise or try to realise what a hell the firing line is and know that every man desires and cannot help but desire immediate peace. The stench from our own dead lying out in front is terrific. It is hard to think that each of these men is some mother's son." George Bollinger, New Zealand volunteer, in Race, Empire and First World War Writing. Ray's song captures perfectly the horror of trench warfare. The leap from hope to death in a second. And the false triumph of those mothers who only have a photo to keep death and despair at bay. As I've already said, to me this album is a masterpiece, and this song in particular is one of the reasons for my saying that. One minute you can glance up to see the sun and the next minute you're dead. "We are the dead. Short days ago we lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, loved and were loved, and now we lie in Flanders fields." John McCrae, Canadian volunteer and poet, died in a military hospital in France, January 28 1918. I'm going to be away again for a few days. I look forward to reading your comments on the next few songs when I get back.
