15. "Get Back in Line" (1970)
Lola Versus Powerman and the Moneygoround, Part One was an awkward, pretentious title for an album. But it produced some of the band’s greatest music. I’m bypassing spiffy rockers like “Powerman” and the supremely arch “Apeman,” as well as one of Davies’ epic nostalgic ballads “A Long Way From Home,” in favor of this somber reflection on the rat-in-a-cage conditions facing British union musicians.
The simple beginning builds in scope and orchestration with John Gosling’s Hammond organ taking the lead. This is the kind of achingly painful, yet beautiful song that Ray Davies could pull off better than anyone. He could get preachy and self-righteous at times, but here he keeps it simple, lovely, and poignant.
14. “Better Things” (1981)
“Better Things” was one of the last top-50 hits the Kinks had and it reveals a Ray Davies who, at least for now, was ready to put away his arch sarcasm and sly putdowns of current conditions. From Ian Gibbons’ keyboard intro, this is as optimistic as Davies would ever get.
It’s not mindless feel-good slop. Ray acknowledges the past – “Here’s hoping that the days ahead – Won’t be as bitter as the ones behind you.” But he chooses to think positively – “Be optimist instead – And somehow happiness will find you.” And as he often did, he brings it back to the power of music as a healing potion in the chorus. It’s the ultimate comfort food in the guise of a three-minute pop song.
13. “David Watts” (1967)
The Kinks, as we will see, recorded one of the iconic rock songs on the subject of sexual identity in 1970. This was not a new subject for Ray Davies. Three years earlier, he led off their Something Else by the Kinks with a deceptively catchy song of schoolboy envy that is laced with suggestions of homoeroticism.
Nicky Hopkins joins on keyboards and sets the song off on a jittery, toe-tapping gallop. Then Ray begins his hero worship of the head boy, with a repeated chorus “Wish I could be like David Watts.” Ray doesn’t take this to the darkness of Paul Simon’s “Richard Cory,” which appeared a few years earlier. He keeps the mood light, but the adolescent longing is palpable and electric.