Ray Davies & the Kinks - Return to Waterloo - Alternate Version (1985)

Before I continue with my series of Kinks stray tracks albums, I have to post this, since I consider it a "must have" for any serious Kinks fan.

This is kind of a Kinks album and kind of a Ray Davies solo album, which is why I put both in the title. In short, it was supposed to be a Kinks soundtrack album to go with a short film written and directed by Ray. Unfortunately, his brother and band member Dave Davies refused to take part for some reason, even though Ray definitely wanted him to. It's all the other Kinks except for Dave, and since he's the lead guitarist there's almost no lead guitar since Ray didn't pick someone else to take his place. I consider it a Kinks album in every way but a technicality of not having Dave's permission to call it that.

In any case, Kinks albums from the 1980s get a lot of criticism for being subpar, but I think this album is really good! I consider it the best Kinks album of the decade... except for one thing: it's rather short. It wasn't very long to begin with, and it includes three songs from the Kinks album that came out just one year earlier, "Word of Mouth." I removed those three songs, since I dislike having duplicates like that in my music collection. That makes the album even shorter!

Luckily, it turns out there's one song that was featured in the "Return to Waterloo" film but never made it onto the album for some reason, "Ladder of Success." A good chunk of the vocals are not Ray's, but he gets more involved in the second half of the song. (I don't know who is singing exactly, but in the film version, actors generally sing most of the songs.) Additionally, an alternate version of the title song "Return to Waterloo" has been released on an archival Kinks collection, so I've put that at the end.

Thanks to those two extra songs, the album ends up being just barely over 30 minutes long. That's still pretty short, but in this case I'll take quality over quantity. With the exception of the short introductory instrumental, all the songs are really strong. This album needs to be heard and appreciated by more Kinks fans! Yes, it has typical 1980s production, with a big drum sound and synthesizers, but in this case I think that fits the songs reasonably well. At the very least, if you like early 1980s Kinks albums, you should like this.

By the way, I've added a bonus track, which is an alternate version of the song "Voices in the Dark." Unlike the alternate version of "Return to Waterloo," I don't see much difference here, except for how the song begins. So I wasn't going to include it, but I felt obliged to take it on for those who might be completists.

01 Intro [Instrumental] (Ray Davies)
02 Return to Waterloo (Ray Davies)
03 Lonely Hearts (Ray Davies)
04 Not Far Away (Ray Davies)
05 Expectations (Ray Davies)
06 Voices in the Dark (Ray Davies)
07 Ladder of Success (Ray Davies)
08 Return to Waterloo [Alternate Version] (Ray Davies)

Voices in the Dark [Alternate Version] (Ray Davies)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16700789/TKNKS1985a_RetrntoWatrloo_atse.zip.html

I used the cover of the official album with no changes.