The Kinks "The Singles Collection"

The Singles Collection is a compilation album by British rock band The Kinks, released in 1997.

The Kinks "Destroyer (Single & Video)"

"Destroyer" is a song by British rock band The Kinks, written by Ray Davies. It was released as a track on the group's nineteenth album, Give the People What They Want, in August 1981, and was the album's lead single in the US. It was not released as a single in the UK.

The song features references to the band's earlier hits, including the riff from 1964's "All Day and All of the Night" and lyrics inspired by 1970's "Lola." Like other Kinks songs of the period, "Destroyer" features a heavier, rock-based sound. After being abandoned during the Low Budget sessions, the song was finally released on Give the People What They Want.

"Destroyer" was initially planned to appear on the band's previous album, Low Budget, appearing in early track listings of the in-progress album. However, the song was dropped from Low Budget because the band could not create a satisfactory mix.


"Destroyer" was ultimately recorded at the Power Station studio. Drummer Mick Avory attributed the song's dense sound to the studio's audio dynamics; he said, "We recorded that at the Power Station in New York in the ambient room, which had a great drum sound. The sound of the room can really affect what you’re doing. When you hear that sound slapping around that big room, you want to cut loose. That’s what I did."

"Destroyer" features many callbacks to previous Kinks songs, both lyrically and musically. The track borrows the main riff from The Kinks' 1964 song, "All Day and All of the Night", which was one of the band's first hits. The lyrics feature the return of the transvestite title character from The Kinks' 1970 hit song, "Lola"; in "Destroyer," the singer brings Lola to his place where he becomes increasingly paranoid.


According to Modern Drummer's Patrick Berkery, the song features a "metallic" sound that reflects the band's "louder and more riff oriented" sound during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Berkery notes Mick Avory's "trashier fills" and "bigger [drum] sound that was miles removed from the lighter touch of his early days."

The track was chosen as the lead single from the album in the US ("Better Things" was the lead single in the UK), although it was released after the album in September. In 1982, the single reached #3 on the Billboard Rock Top Tracks chart and #85 on the Billboard Hot 100.


In the UK, the track was available only when the album was released there in January 1982.

The Kinks "Give The People What They Want"

Give the People What They Want is the eighteenth studio album by the English rock group, The Kinks. It was released in August 1981 in the US but not until January 1982 in Europe. It was delayed because Ray Davies wanted to produce a full length video for the album but financing fell through. Also scrapped were plans to remix the album for the European market. It was initially aimed to be a statement on the media.

When the Kinks' six Arista studio albums, initially released between 1977 and 1984, were reissued in 1999, Give the People What They Want was the only one that did not contain bonus tracks, despite the fact that the single release of "Better Things" was slightly different from the album version. The British single of "Better Things" also included a non-album B-side, "Massive Reductions", which was different from the version of the song from the band's 1984 album Word of Mouth.

The Kinks "Schoolboys In Disgrace"

Schoolboys in Disgrace or The Kinks Present Schoolboys in Disgrace is a 1975 concept album by the Kinks. It was considered to be the last album by critics in what they dubbed the group's "theatrical" period, and their final release for RCA Records.

According to the back cover liner notes, the story which the album presents is as follows:

Once upon a time there was a naughty little schoolboy. He and his gang were always playing tricks on the teachers and bullying other children in the school. One day he got himself into very serious trouble with a naughty schoolgirl and he was sent to the Headmaster who decided to disgrace the naughty boy and his gang in front of the whole school. 
After this punishment the boy turned into a hard and bitter character. Perhaps it was not the punishment that changed him but the fact that he realised people in authority would always be there to kick him down and the Establishment would always put him in his place. He knew that he could not change the past but he vowed that in the future he would always get what he wanted. The naughty little boy grew up... into Mr Flash.

Mr Flash was the name of the villain from the Kinks' rock opera Preservation (released as Preservation Act 1 and Preservation Act 2).

In 2015, Dave Davies spoke positively of the album in a Yahoo interview, saying, "Schoolboys in Disgrace is a great album. At the time, we were so busy doing it and getting it out and touring and playing it. Over a matter of three years it was gone and we were doing something else. But when you draw this into the present, it’s like, 'Oh my God, what the f— is this?!? How did we do that?' We've been very fortunate, Ray and I and the Kinks. We’ve had such a wealth of materials, ideas, and observations. We’ve been very good at following our intuition. That's something you can’t really teach."

The front cover was illustrated by Mickey Finn of T. Rex. It later appeared on NME's list of the '50 worst covers of all time'.

In 1978 the Finnish band Kontra had a number one hit with the song "Jerry Cotton" which was a cover version of the song "Jack the Idiot Dunce."

Various Artists "Time Life: Sounds Of The Eighties - 1983"

Time Life: Sounds of the Eighties was a 10-volume series issued by Time-Life.