Intro to The Kinks song?

[weav]

So what song first introduced you to The Kinks?

For me, it was last year, and I heard a cover band play King Kong of all things. I was listening to the Ron and Fez show on XM (as I do every day), and the band at the party they were at played it. I search the Interwebs based on the lyric, "I'm Kink Kong, got a hydrogen bomb, I can blow up your house..." What an odd lyric, but it was my introduction.

I later bought the Arthur release with the Kink Kong bonus track and listened to King Kong endlessly. It wasn't until I got tired of King Kong that I finaly listened to the album and was hooked.

How about you?

[Kinkcan]

For me, it was last century when I heard You Really Got Me on the radio.
;D

I already was a Beatles fan but man ... those Kinks sounded like nobody else before .

[kinkfrank49]

Same for me. It was introduced on an AM radio station, and they had a 'request line' contest every night. At the end of a few hours, they would play the most requested song each night. For about three weeks, every night at the end of the countdown, at number one, it was YRGM. I went out and bought the record as soon as the store had it and played the grooves off that thing. Then bought the album and wondered why it all didn't sound like YRGM. The album was mono and cost $2.49.

[HollyH]

Well, it sure is nice to be among fellow fans of the same vintage. ;D Yep, YRGM for me too. Although I have to say it frightened me a little bit, at my tender age; I wasn't sure what to make of these guys, and anyway I really was completely daft over the Beatles at the time. The same thing happened for me at about the same time with the Animals; I was haunted by "House of the Rising Sun," but it was a little too bluesy and gritty (and let's admit it, too sexy) for me then. It wasn't until "Dedicated Follower of Fashion" that I really knew the Kinks were for me.

And then of course, the ban happened, and I lost track of them for a couple years...but that's another thread...

[Iñakink]

It wasn't a particular song. I copied this from another thread:

When I was 10, I was obsessed with The Beatles, they were the only band in the world, but one day my uncle said: "There is more life apart of The Beatles". I answered "I don't think so" and a few weeks after that he sent me a tape with The Kinks biggest hits and also a lot of songs from Face To Face and Something Else. I listened to it a few times and I liked it, but I didn’t care too much about it. A few years later, when I was a bit more open-minded, I saw the Ultimate Collection and I thought it would be cool to have a "Best Of" The Kinks, they were not a bad band after all! So I got it as a Birthday present and I was absolutely blown away. I started to listen to The Kinks every day and to buy all the albums. Soon they became my favourite band.

[complicatedlife]

I've told this story many times before, so those who've read this before, please forgive me...

I was born, lucky me, to a British War Bride. I spent the summer of '64 visiting my grandparents in Grimsby (Lincolnshire). It was there I first heard YRGM (I may have seen them perform it on the telly, but I can't swear to it). I was only aware of their singles, since I couldn't afford to buy LP's (I was 10 years old).

In April '66, our family moved from NYC to New Zealand (my Mum's family emigrated there from England) where I got to enjoy the singles that would be virtually banned from American Airwaves. When we moved back to NYC in 1968, I went looking for Kinks LP's, but could only find the first "Kinks Greatest Hits". It was like the Kinks no longer existed.

Sometime during the winter of 1970, my friend bought "Arthur" and when he played it, it was like Ray was looking into my deepest thoughts --- He was singing about my street in Shangri-La - the houses across the street from mine were an uniterrupted 8-block long row of identical Cape Cod houses (a long-gone rail spur ran along a gully behind those houses and no cross street went through because of that gully); he mentioned my Mum's favorite singer (Vera Lynn) and used a line from her most-famous song (We'll Meet Again) on Mr. Churchill Says; and he even sang about chill blaines (I suffered from that cursed malady while in New Zealand!) in Nothing To Say.

Needless to say, that was the moment I knew the Kinks were what music was all about...and I lived happily ever after (well, as far as music goes).

[kinkfrank49]

When they first hit with those seminal, pounding singles, I was blown away. I bought all the American LPs, which had so-so album cuts till Kontroversy, and I was learning lead guitar so I was a huge fan of them, the Stones, and the Beatles, and I also loved the Animals since they were a darker, bluesier group. I thought Well Respected Man was a great cut and a different sound, it was a single top ten hit in California, then Kontroversy had Milk Cow Blues and such a different sound. I could not believe how good Face to Face was. I still think it is the best LP of 1966.

[powerman]

I can't say which song gets the credit, but when I was at school The Jam covered David Watts and The Pretenders did Stop Your Sobbing, when I heard they were by The Kinks, I thought "Oh, they did YRGM, might be OK" Then I heard Lola on the radio, and when I realised that was by the same band, I had to check out a greatest hits. I couldn't believe it as I read the sleeve and realised how many of the songs I knew and really liked, but had no idea they were all by the same band. A few listens and I was hooked.

[donl]

I was aware of the kinks but never really listened to them other than what was on the radio and in the nyc area at the time they didn't get much play except on cbs fm which played the early era songs and lola from time to time. i remember hearing a radio spot for the sleepwalker album that caught my ear so i went out and bought it and was hooked immediately i then went and caught up with what i had missed by buying almost all their previous albums before misfits came out, saw them for the 1st time at hofstra university 5/4/77 and have been on board ever since.

[waterloosunset]

you really got me, but specially waterloo sunset

[frankbrown]

1964 YRGM in black and white on Top Of The Pops.

Little did I know my life would change forever.

Frank.

[muswellhillbilly22]

Sunny Afternoon, Lola and Waterloo Sunset did it for me.

When I found out these three songs were by the same group I instantly knew there was something special about The Kinks and that they weren't just a one-hit wonder.