I'll be god damned if I couldn't write a whole months worth of posts on the Kinks and their late sixties to, oh I don't know, early eighties slew of Koncept albums. Seriously, Ray Davies was like some sort of Koncept vampire that fed on the shit at night, returning to his studio to kraft relatively brilliant albums about simpler times, the record industry, a transplanted hillbilly culture in England, and God knows what else. Ray Davies and the Kinks could be accused of a lot of things. Sacrificing artistic integrity for the sake of album sales will definitely never be one of them. So why Village Green? The Kinks made a kornicopia of koncept albums, each a little krazier than the next (I will stop this soon, I promise), so why Village? Because it was their first, and arguably best koncept album, and that is what December is going to be all about. That, and the birth of Jesus.
So, why is the Kinks "Are the Village Green Preservation Society" such a great concept album? Because it has all the elements of a good concept album - the experimentation, the loosely related songs that you really have to listen to get the, you know, concept, and the artistic vision that allows it to more or less transcend the era in which it was made. What sets it apart then? Well, it is almost pathologically designed to be a complete and utter commercial failure. Lets see, its 1968 and the kids are out buying records. Whats new on the shelves? Jimi Hendrix "Are you Experienced?" The Rolling Stones "Beggars Banquet" and a debut album by some band called Led Zepplin. Oh, and an album by the Kinks that's an homage to a rapidly disappearing (if it ever existed at all) pastoral way of life in the rural towns of north and midlands of England. What is surprising when you look at the context of the album is not that it failed, but that some record company executive (not known for their desire to nourish deeply personal, difficult projects) listened to it and didn't say "Are you fucking kidding me?"
Which brings us back to my original point. What is so good about this album? Well, asides from, you know, the album itself, I will confess here and now that as a music fan, I have a large tear in my heart for artists who take their artistic vision so seriously, so personally, that they almost seem dead set on sabotaging their careers in order to see the birth of that vision. Ray Davies wanted to make an album of nostalgic music for an era that was really memory before he was born, but one whose simplicity appealed so much to him, he basically bankrupted his band to get across how much he missed the Village Green. Seriously, that is artistic dedication. How deep does this respect for artistic self sabotage run? I will say this once, and only once to prove my point. Regardless of how big a piece of poop it is (and it is a large, over-produced, corn-rowed turd clogging the musical bowl) I have a pretty big respect for Axl Rose's quixotic drive to take 17 fucking years to make Chinese Democracy. So there you go, I definitely just said I respect self destructive artistic tendencies so much, I even respect Axl. But not that album, it is terrible.
So much like a smaller, quieter, and far less shitty Chinese Democracy, "The Village Green Preservation Society" is a true test of artistic vision being executed, regardless of consequence. And it only took two years to make. What of the songs on this album? At this point, does it really even matter what I say about them at this point? If you haven't heard this album, nothing I can say about the music can top what I have written about the idea of the album itself (at least in my humble opinion), and either you immediately want to hear it, or you are thinking "this guy is an idiot." But either way, what can I say about the songs? I guess only that they are awesome!
The opening track might be the perfect open to a concept album, setting the idea that the album will thread its way through for the remaining 15 songs. It is about an organization dedicated to all preserving all the things that the unnamed narrator or narrators find truly wonderful about their pastoral lives. And then the album sets about drawing the picture of that life in all its magnificence, dullness, hope, despair, love and tragedy. Seriously, I am not being disingenuous here, the album is really about that. The third song, "Picture Book" has the lyric: "picture book/pictures of each other/taken by another/ proof we loved each other/ a long time ago." That is Davies whole concept in a few lines right there. The constant reminder of how much better things were in the past, though these memories might not be as perfect as we always think of them. Song after song touches this theme in subtle, endearing ways. A true lyrical masterpiece if one was ever written.
So how does this album stack up over time? Well, it is now rightfully considered a masterpiece, a work of genius that was sunk under the weight of the 60's because it wasn't angry, or boastful or bombastic. Instead, its a subtle, thoughtful album about things past, and how things past really aren't as we would like to remember them. A pretty solid concept if you ask me.
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1 comment:
Great review!
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