The Kinks

The finest Kinks album of the 1970s offers alternately wistful, humorous and melancholic views on modern life. The album's title describes its English Pub Rock Played By Folks From West Virginia sound - which might have been the birth of Alt Country, but the Kinks were always too smart to be pigeonholed.

Can you tell the Kinks apart in the picture on the cover of their new album? No, of course.
Except for Ray, they all look the same these days. Faceless. Their music has also been
sounding that way lately. Still, they're a heap better than most other groups you could ever
name. Musically, the Kinks' roots in the British Music Hall tradition really show up strongly
on Muswell Hillbillies. At least five songs could be described as this type, and wh... More >

Because the Kinks Klaque hyped this as a great album when a simple perusal of the lyrics revealed more of the same olde alienation, I overreacted violently, but in an unsentimental retrospect I can hear it, and I do mean hear. Most of its charms are in the casual-to-messy eclecticism with which it revives time-honored effects from the music hall and the mod era and even the mountains, and in the dotty good humor of Ray Davies's singing, which makes you think that maybe--just maybe--he doesn't take the "Acute Schizophrenia Paranoia Blues" of the "20th Century Man" at face value. But combine those two titles circa 2001 and you're in the court of the Crimson King. (Grade - B+)