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The Journey, Pt. 2
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The Journey, Pt. 2
Current price: $17.59
Barnes and Noble
The Journey, Pt. 2
Current price: $17.59
Size: CD
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The Kinks
continue their series of plus-size overview anthologies with 2023's
The Journey, Pt. 2
, in which the great band takes a look back at its career and the themes and ideas behind its songs. While this album is sequenced thematically rather than chronologically, for the most part it's devoted to the period when their string of brilliant but commercially overlooked albums like 1967's
Something Else by the Kinks
and 1969's
Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire)
was broken by the smash hit "Lola'' in 1970. After signing a new record deal with
RCA
,
Ray Davies
next occupied himself with overblown rock operas such as 1973's
Preservation: Act 1
, 1974's
Preservation: Act 2
, and 1974's
The Kinks Present a Soap Opera
, which derailed the momentum they'd gained. While there are plenty of great singles and superb album tracks included in
, most fans and critics regard the band's (or at least
') fascination with unsubtle narrative pieces in the '70s as the nadir of their catalog, and it's hard not to feel like
Ray
wanted to use this compilation as an opportunity to prompt a re-examination of those albums. This set cherry-picks most of the best songs from the two
Preservation
albums and
Soap Opera
, and while "Scrapheap City," "Money Talks," and "Where Are They Now" are better than most folks remember, their inclusion makes it obvious that they were written as part of a larger narrative, and their insistence on establishing ongoing characters weighs them down. That said, any album that includes "David Watts," "See My Friends," "A Well Respected Man," and of course "Lola," is going to be worth hearing, and the remastering makes the tracks sound as good as they deserve. A few relevant
Dave Davies
solo sides are also included (including "Susannah's Still Alive" and "Lincoln County"), and three previously unheard tracks from a 1975 concert show that
the Kinks
still knew how to deliver on-stage even if their albums of the period were lackluster. (The set also includes song-by-song notes from
, and
Mick Avory
, though they usually seem to be going out of their way not to reveal anything interesting.) A large portion of
is dedicated to exploring a fallow period in the story of a truly great band, but
were truly great, and even their lesser material was smarter, more interesting, and more ambitious than what nearly all their peers were doing, and that is made clear on this album. ~ Mark Deming
continue their series of plus-size overview anthologies with 2023's
The Journey, Pt. 2
, in which the great band takes a look back at its career and the themes and ideas behind its songs. While this album is sequenced thematically rather than chronologically, for the most part it's devoted to the period when their string of brilliant but commercially overlooked albums like 1967's
Something Else by the Kinks
and 1969's
Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire)
was broken by the smash hit "Lola'' in 1970. After signing a new record deal with
RCA
,
Ray Davies
next occupied himself with overblown rock operas such as 1973's
Preservation: Act 1
, 1974's
Preservation: Act 2
, and 1974's
The Kinks Present a Soap Opera
, which derailed the momentum they'd gained. While there are plenty of great singles and superb album tracks included in
, most fans and critics regard the band's (or at least
') fascination with unsubtle narrative pieces in the '70s as the nadir of their catalog, and it's hard not to feel like
Ray
wanted to use this compilation as an opportunity to prompt a re-examination of those albums. This set cherry-picks most of the best songs from the two
Preservation
albums and
Soap Opera
, and while "Scrapheap City," "Money Talks," and "Where Are They Now" are better than most folks remember, their inclusion makes it obvious that they were written as part of a larger narrative, and their insistence on establishing ongoing characters weighs them down. That said, any album that includes "David Watts," "See My Friends," "A Well Respected Man," and of course "Lola," is going to be worth hearing, and the remastering makes the tracks sound as good as they deserve. A few relevant
Dave Davies
solo sides are also included (including "Susannah's Still Alive" and "Lincoln County"), and three previously unheard tracks from a 1975 concert show that
the Kinks
still knew how to deliver on-stage even if their albums of the period were lackluster. (The set also includes song-by-song notes from
, and
Mick Avory
, though they usually seem to be going out of their way not to reveal anything interesting.) A large portion of
is dedicated to exploring a fallow period in the story of a truly great band, but
were truly great, and even their lesser material was smarter, more interesting, and more ambitious than what nearly all their peers were doing, and that is made clear on this album. ~ Mark Deming
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