Something Else by The Kinks by The Kinks

Something Else by the Kinks, the band's fifth album, landed on Pye on 15 September 1967, and it finds Ray Davies peering over the garden fence at his neighbours. His songs are small, sharp, observational sketches of English life, dressed in baroque pop and the oompah of the old music halls, with Nicky Hopkins' keyboards and the backing voices of Ray's wife Rasa adding the frills. Dave Davies, Pete Quaife and Mick Avory keep it all nimble.

It was Shel Talmy's last go at producing the band; from here on Ray ran the sessions himself. "Waterloo Sunset", one of the most admired songs they ever cut, went ahead of it into the UK top 3, and so did Dave's own solo single, "Death of a Clown". The press liked the album, the public mostly passed it by, and it took years for it to become the cult favorite it is now.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.