Retro Spins: The Kinks - Think Visual

 

After a brief hiatus, which you'll learn about in two days, I returned to The Kinks to hit their 1986 released Think Visual. With the steady decline I had been experiencing in their albums, I wasn't expecting much, but at least my head was cleared, and I was ready to get back into it.

Its release saw a continued steady decline in their overall mainstream popularity, with Think Visual only peaking at number eighty-one on the Billboard and failing to push enough units to achieve any certifications. As noted yesterday in my post on their 1984 released Word Of Mouth, that album actually included their last Billboard Hot 100 hit for the remainder of their career. As such, the album also doesn't offer any singles to expect.

With low expectations, I fired it up. While opener Working At The Factory felt basic in terms of instrumentation, the lyrics were what hooked me. Basically, it tells the story about how Davies fictionally worked in a factory in his youth, and found music, only to end up in a corporate factory churning out albums. This was followed by the decent Lost And Found.

However, from there, things went South fast. To the point that I started asking myself if perhaps the problem was that The Kinks were simply artistically bankrupt, with nothing further to really give to their albums. Then How Are You came on. Amazing song, and great music video to boot.

From there, the remainder of the album seemed to kick into overdrive, making up for the first half in droves. Think Visual (the song), Natural Gift, Killing Time, and When You Were A Child all punched hard. It kind of reinvigorated me for a band I had all but given up on at this point, and it does make me want to dive into their last release for the decade, 1989's UK Jive.

Before that wears off, let me get running over to that one. See you tomorrow.

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