Product Review

In the first ten years of their career, the Kinks underwent a creative explosion that was almost unparalleled in popular music. Starting with simple but potent garage rock tracks like You Really Got Me, the band, and lead singer/songwriter Ray Davies, quickly became one of the most idiosyncratic bands of the 60s, recording classic singles like Days and Waterloo Sunset, and albums like The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society, widely regarded as one of the best albums of all time. In this book, Andrew Hickey analyses every studio recording by the Kinks from their first album in 1964 through to the epic triple concept album Preservation a decade later, looking at what influenced the songs, their subject matter, and the stylistic changes the band went through. Hickey takes a critical look at what makes songs like Lola, Sunny Afternoon and All Day And All Of The Night work, in a book that is full of forthright and sometimes controversial opinion.