The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society - 50th Anniversary Super Deluxe Now Confirmed!

My signed glossy arrived today. Signature was required. Glad my son was home to sign! Really quality piece that completes the collection quite nicely.

 

Two of the DVDs I ordered from the UK arrived today. The other four (from another eBay seller) and my signed glossy did not. Since I have an unexpected day off of work tomorrow, I wonder if it'd be worth it to wait...?

 

I got mine a few days ago, like you I e mailed them months ago so you should eventually receive it.

 

Has anyone in Australia received their missing photo yet? I've been away for 6 weeks and just got home expecting it to be with the held mail, but no luck

 

Just finished watching the Sky Arts 'Echoes Of A World' doc after an aborted attempt over Christmas, just wanted to post my thoughts on that fwiw.

*Impressive selection of guests eulogising the album (no Wes Anderson as promised though). Their comments ranged from the insightful to the banal but were in the main welcome. I thought Andy Partridge was the most engaging in his enthusiasm. The bits where the producer guy did some Howard Goodall style dissections of the compositions of songs were fascinating to me as a Kinks nerd and would have liked to have seen more of this.

*The decision to use the actor who played Ray in Sunny Afternoon to perform rather inauthentic heavy handed paraphrases of where Ray's head was at at the time was in my opinion an unmitigated failure, and the worst part of the show by far. It would have been better if they'd used actual quotes from Ray: surely X-Ray could have been mined for some decent soundbites? Better still would probably have been to omit these bits altogether and conveyed this info in a less jarring way.

*Ray, Dave and Mick were all interviewed, but with the content mentioned above they seemed a bit sidelined, guests in their own story. Part of this is possibly because as has been much discussed, Dave and especially Ray come across as very frail these days, and perhaps it was felt that the Ray of today lacked the presence to 'carry' the story of the album, hence the mocked up bits with the actor playing his younger self. While Ray came across as distant, Dave (despite similar frailty issues) seemed much more outspoken and offered some new observations. His obvious wonder at the work they'd created together was infectious and likeable.

*The only unseen performance footage was from the 1994 To The Bone acoustic show at which the first 3 VGPS songs were played, including the only known professionally filmed footage of the Kinks performing 'Do You Remember Walter’, albeit 26 years later. As others have mentioned, this show surely has to be released officially at some point! A decent amount of the Once More With Felix footage finally got the chance to be reshown on TV, 50 years later. The Pop Goes The 60s 'Days' and In Concert 'VGPS' were also mined to illustrate the respective songs. No 'Starstruck' though, despite the fact there is a video available for it.

*The other songs for which no visuals were available (although not every song was covered) were illustrated by new illustrations by Dave Davies and several of the interviewees, which was kind of interesting but variably successful. Kind of quaint really to have songs like that illustrated by a single image. Have to say that Dave's illustration of the Phenomenal Cat nailed it for me, and Andy Partridge's 'Walter' as included in the box set is also good. I also enjoy the fact that this project led to Natalie Merchant drawing Desperate Dan.

 

My missing photo arrived today, signed for. I wasn't too bothered about it being missing when I got the set, but it a very nice inclusion and I'm glad to have it.

 

My signed photo showed up in Seattle yesterday; needed to sign for it too.

 

Still no sign of mine. Maybe if I just stopped worrying, it may show up...

@Dave Hoos @John Fell @tonewheeltom I turn 28 years old on Monday. It’d really be great if BMG came through for the big day...

 

You’re my sons age. He turned 28 mid December.

 

Please, Mister, where does it get stored in the box ?

 

I just slipped into the front of the book. It ain’t rocket science

 

Yer a clever lad and no mistake !

 

No kidding. Is he into all the same music like you/we are?

You're making me jealous.

 

I stuffed it in the envelope

 

A convenient place for such an inconvenience.

 

and where did you stuff the envelope?

 

“It was the most magical birthday ever, I remember it like yesterday. The postal carrier (we had those back in the early 21st century, young un) walked up to the door, carrying a flat envelope, and I wondered, will I have to sign for that? Is that really my autographed Kinks photo that all the boys on the Hoffman forum have?”

 

´
Village Green Preservation Society is one of my favorite Top 10 British Rock LPs of 1968.
Much better than the overrated Beatles White Album.

Though, in my humble opinion, it is not in the same league as the unmatched & heavily underrated masterpiece of that particular year - 'Music in a Doll's House' from Family:










..........................................

 

It belongs in the envelope - where else would it go?

 

Wouldn’t that be great if it were true? First, @Mazzy then @tonewheeltom ...

 

Still no sign of my photo or any contact from the label. I guess I will have to try again.

 

No doubt that 1968 was a fertile year. That's exactly why I wouldn't play off these fantastic albums against each other. But rather enjoy the diversity. Wasn't "SF Sorrow" also from that very year?

 

Just yesterday I was thinking about the very same thing.

 

Has anyone heard anything official about an Arthur SDE? As VGPS was announced more than 12 months in advance I’m starting to think that it won’t happen.

 

The official announcement wasn’t though? We just had some trinkets here and there. It’ll be a while yet I reckon.