4 Must-Have Albums for Your Kinks Vinyl Collection

Of all the bands who emerged from the British Invasion, perhaps none was as versatile as The Kinks. They could deliver the rock thunder, which was their area of focus early in their career. But then they demonstrated nuance and insight in their songwriting, thanks mainly to frontman Ray Davies.

They also displayed impressive longevity. That makes it difficult to choose just four albums to build a foundation for your Kinks vinyl collection. But we’re going to take a flyer at it anyway.

‘Something Else’

The Kinks first drew attention for the fuzzy riffs that emerged from Dave Davies’ lead guitar on classic singles “You Really Got Me” and “All Day And All Of The Night”. But they seamlessly transitioned into the baroque pop period on the Something Else album. Ray Davies raised his songwriting game several notches on this album, with piercing character sketches like “Two Sisters” and “David Watts” leading the way. Let’s not forget about Dave Davies’ songwriting contributions. They also hit a high point on this record thanks to “Death Of A Clown” and “Love Me Till The Sun Shines”. Ray gets the final word with “Waterloo Sunset”, one of the loveliest ballads of that or any other era.

‘The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society’

Ray Davies began to fall in love with the theme album in the late 60s. Eventually, that approach would harden into records that followed strict storylines from song to song. But these records were at their best when Ray would lock into a loose concept and riff on it throughout the record. That was the case with The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society, the first of the band’s conceptual forays. These albums also coincided with a willingness to move away from rock to occasionally more antiquated forms of music. The band crams 15 lovely snapshots of an idyllic, fading vision of England onto this wonderfully realized record.

‘Muswell Hillbillies’

On Muswell Hillbillies, Ray Davies fixated on his home country once again. But in this case, he managed to both romanticize a certain bucolic existence while still portraying it, warts and all. After all, the portraits painted in “Acute Schizophrenia Paranoia Blues”, “Alcohol”, and “Holloway Jail” are quite dire. Opening track “20th Century Man”, which finds the band rocking like the old days, rants and rages against encroaching modernity. There are also moments of melodic brilliance throughout. They include the touching ballad “Oklahoma U.S.A.” and the rambling closer “Muswell Hillbilly”, which sends this album out on a triumphantly defiant note.

‘State Of Confusion’

We’re not going to sit here and tell you that State Of Confusion is one of The Kinks’ four finest albums. But we think it’s important to represent the later part of their career in any vinyl collection. By that, we mean the years when Ray Davies mostly set aside their conceptual ambitions and focused again on a more song-oriented approach. Not only was State Of Confusion the most artistically assured of these records, but it also brought The Kinks back to the pop spotlight with the brilliant hit single “Come Dancing”. The best parts of the album manage to mine that same vein of nostalgia and melancholy, as on “Don’t Forget To Dance” and “Heart Of Gold”.

Photo by Tom Hustler/Central Press/Hulton Archive/Getty Images