Kinks Synthetic Fan Mix 1 Face To Face

Face To Face by The Kinks is one of the great rock albums of all time. It is one of the first album oriented rock albums in history. As great as this album is, there were many compromises in the way the album has always been presented. For starters reportedly Ray Davies leader of The Kinks wanted the songs to be tied together more closely and sometimes with sound effects. He also was hoping for a stark black cover as opposed to the somewhat psychedelic cover art that graced the album. I have made a remix that takes the stereo and electronically processed stereo tracks and makes them sound more integrated. I have made a special remixed version of this album that blends the songs together without pauses of silence in between. In many cases I even overlapped the tracks slightly to give it a greater concept album feel. I also adjusted the stereo separation so that songs fit better together. Reducing separation on some tracks so that they sound better paired with the mono tracks. The volume falls in between the 1980's CDs of this album and newer versions distributed by Castle communications. I took the artistic liberty of starting the album with "She's Got Everything" which was recorded during the Face To Face sessions but only released as a B-side a couple of years later. This way the album begins with 2 lively numbers in a row before settling into the introspective feel of the later tracks. After that the album falls into the same track listing as the original UK vinyl release, and has about 4 bonus tracks after that. Purists should be informed that every track was remixed somewhat, so this is mainly just a fan mix of the Face To Face album. I hope this will lead people to go buy one of the official releases of this great album, it is not intended to be a replacement. The cover art was made to more closely reflect what Ray Davies said he wanted for the album. Since this album is in print, I will only offer this remix for a limited time. I strongly suggest that you buy the CD somewhere and treat this as a fan mix only. That being said please enjoy this labor of love. It is in flac format so that the album will keep the smooth continuity.

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The Great Lost Kinks Album (and Bonus Track)

Those doggone Kinks, before discovering them, I didn't use to care about having every song by an artist. The Kinks are one of those rare bands that make such consistently great music. I find myself needing to own their entire recorded output. The Great Lost Kinks Album is an album I have owned since childhood, and have found it very hard to acquire all of these songs on CD. I own about 50 separate Kinks CDs, yet some of these songs are still proving to be quite elusive to find. There is another blog called Blues Town, that offers a link to the pure vinyl version exactly as it sounded in 1973. I recommend this link to the vinyl purists out there. For those like myself who want to hear how it might sound if Warner or Castle would ever issue it on CD, I am offering a link to a remastered edition. Only 3 songs on this version are taken from vinyl copies, the rest come from various Castle & Rhino CDs of expanded Kinks albums. A few songs are now in true stereo for the first time with this album. A portion of these tracks were intended to be released on an album to be named "Four More Respected Gentlemen" which was never released. Many of the other tracks were probably intended to be on "The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society", which Ray Davies Supposedly originally intended to make into a double LP. Many of these songs only appeared officially as b-sides to import singles. As an album it is not exceptionally strong, and differs greatly from the harder rock that The Kinks were usually known for. It does serve as a nice companion piece to The Kink Kronikles collection. Ray Davies was outraged at Warner/Reprise issuing this LP without his consent, and that is probably why it is such a rare album to this day. But for those of us that appreciate even The Kinks weaker songs, this is a must have LP. "Animals In The Zoo" has been offered as a bonus track, to hopefully make the LP stronger as a whole. It is from the same soundtrack as "The Way Love Used To Be", so it fits in conceptually as well. the album art shown here has been retouched by me so that the album title will be visible at jewel case size. To Ray or Dave and license holder, if you disapprove of this link, I will remove it immediately.

1 Till Death Do Us Part
2. There Is No Life Without Love
3. Lavender Hill
4. Groovy Movies
5. Rosemary Rose
6. Misty Water
7. Mister Songbird
8. When I Turn off the Living Room Light
9. The Way Love Used to Be
10. I'm Not Like Everybody Else
11. Plastic Man
12. This Man He Weeps Tonight
13. Pictures in the Sand
14. Where Did My Spring Go?
15. Animals In The Zoo (Bonus Track)

The Great Lost Kinks Album (LAME VBR mp3s)