The Kinks – Where Was Spring? - Non-Album Tracks (1968-1969)

This is the last of my albums gathering up stray tracks from the Kinks 1960s golden era. This covers 1968 and 1969. I’m not sure what happened to the band after this time, but even though the next couple of Kinks albums were strong, the amount of non-album tracks made public after this drops off dramatically. Given that the next three albums have gotten the deluxe edition or even super deluxe edition treatment, either more songs simply don’t exist or the Kinks don’t think they’re good enough to ever release.

But 1969 was still a great year, especially since Dave Davies was planning a solo album (probably called "A Hole in the Sock of Dave Davies") that never got released. As a result, this is an unusually Dave-heavy album, with seven songs written and sung by him and seven by Ray. But that’s fine, because Dave was coming up with the best songs of his career.

The first three songs were B-sides. The fourth, "Plastic Man," was an A-side and a minor hit in Britain. The rest all weren't released until later. They came out on albums like "The Great Lost Kinks Album," "Hidden Treasure," "Unfinished Business," and as bonus tracks to certain deluxe versions of "Arthur" and "The Village Green Preservation Society."

There’s a curious story behind the album title I chose. Ray Davies was commissioned to write songs for a six-episode BBC series called "Where Was Spring?" Apparently, he did five, and his versions (presumably backed by the Kinks) were broadcast on each show with animations made to fit the lyrics. All of the episodes have been lost, apparently. Two of the Kinks songs survived and were later released: "Where Did the Spring Go?" and "When I Turn Off the Living Room Light." The audio of another, "Darling I Respect You," exists on YouTube, but the quality is so poor that it’s pretty much unlistenable, so I didn’t include that here. The other two are "We Are Two of a Kind" and "Let’s Take Off All Our Clothes."

Anyway, there was a plan to release an EP or album called "Where Was Spring?" with those songs from the BBC series on it, but that never happened. I’m using the title for my album here, since it was a title the Kinks wanted to use in 1969, even though it was a different sort of project.

In this series of Kinks albums, I’ve included virtually every song they recorded that has become public, except for a small number of instrumentals. But there’s an exception this time around. I didn’t include “Are You Ready Girl,” even though it has vocals. Partly that’s because it’s a Dave song and the album is already very Dave heavy, but mostly it’s because I just don’t think it’s a good song. To me, it’s the exception that proves the rule: the fact that there’s only one sung non-album track by the Kinks in this era that doesn’t stand up to repeated listenings in my opinion suggests the incredible quality of their songs during this time.

I plan to also post the Dave Davies solo album at a later time, using alternate versions for a bunch of the tracks to make that a less repetitive thing. "Are You Ready Girl" will be on that.

By the way, the late 60s instrumentals I didn’t include on these albums are: "Little Women," "Easy Come, There You Went," "Egg Stained Pyjamas," "Mick Avory’s Underpants," and "Spotty Grotty Anna." In my opinion they’re okay, but nothing special. The main appeal of the Kinks for me are the lyrics, the melodies, and the singing. Dave Davies is a very talented (and often underused) lead guitarist, but those instrumentals are more like backing tracks that never had the vocals added (and in fact that probably is the case for some of them), so there’s no impressive soloing.

Note that the song "(Could It Be) You're Getting Old" IS a Ray Davies solo piano demo from 1968. I made some edits to it, which are explained here:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2018/11/the-kinks-could-it-be-that-youre.html

 

This album is 39 minutes long.

01 King Kong (Kinks)
02 Mindless Child of Motherhood (Kinks)
03 This Man He Weeps Tonight (Kinks)
04 Plastic Man (Kinks)
05 Mr. Shoemaker’s Daughter (Kinks)
06 Pictures in the Sand (Kinks)
07 Till Death Us Do Part (Kinks)
08 Climb Your Wall (Kinks)
09 Groovy Movies (Kinks)
10 Where Did My Spring Go (Kinks)
11 I’m Crying (Kinks)
12 When I Turn Off the Living Room Light (Kinks)
13 Do You Wish to Be a Man (Kinks)
14 (Could It Be) You’re Getting Old [Edit] (Kinks)

 

https://www.upload.ee/files/15485463/TKnks_1969_WhereWsSpring_atse.zip.html

 

I stumbled across some drawings that Klaus Voormann (who designed the Beatles' Revolver album cover, amongst other things) did to illustrate the Kinks songs done for "Where Was Spring?" So I figured that was as close as we'd ever get to something fitting for the cover art. I added a slightly colorful background to make it a bit more interesting.