Wednesday, March 11, 2015

A Forgotten Latter Day Gem From Ray Davies




This song comes from a bonus disc included on one of those kountless Kinks kompilations on Kastle, I mean, Castle. Ray had a book out of short stories at the time titled Waterloo Sunset. Each story was named after, and based on, a Kinks song. The bonus disc was called- "The Songs Of Ray Davies Waterloo Sunset." It collected all the songs named in the book, including 2 previously unreleased gems. (The other is "The Million Pound Semi-Detatched.) They're credited as demos, but they sound refreshing compared to the bombastic production of latter day Kinks records.

I haven't heard this tune in ages. It popped up on shuffle yesterday and knocked me out.

(h/t hpunch)

7 comments:

William Repsher said...

I think that compilation also had demo versions of tracks like "Return to Waterloo" that never seemed to quite register with fans (despite being as good as any of their early 80's comeback material).

I go with "Next Door Neighbour" for forgotten latter-day gems. I remember him playing that a show he did in a small theater in the West Village, late 90's, and thinking, "That's as good as anything The Kinks ever did." But I don't think anything else on the album that eventually came out was anywhere near that level.

It's been a very long time since Ray put out anything!

buzzbabyjesus said...

I'm rather fond of this bonus track from the latest version of Lola vs Powerman Etc.

http://alanwalkerart.com/audio/kinks_anytime.mp3

hpunch said...

Over My Head from Ray's first solo release, Other People's Lives still knocks my wooly socks off.

hpunch said...

I love My Diary as well. I'd love to hear a full Kinks recorded version. This is an obvious demo

hpunch said...

Anytime is a killer, I agree buzzbabyjesus.
The other new bonus track, The Good Life, of the recent Lola reissue is another winner

Anonymous said...

I too like Anytime. Weirdly, there's something late Paul McCartney/Beatles-ish about it, though. Maybe it's the guitar, the harmonies in the bridge, or the Ringo Starr-like drumming.

Anonymous said...

I thought Anytime sounded more like Badfinger in a really good way.