Ray Davies Teams Up With The Jayhawks, Listen To ‘Poetry’ From His Upcoming Album

Ray Davies may be English but his upcoming album will be called ‘Americana’, and this should not come as a surprise for anybody as the Kinks have inspired American music as much as they have been inspired by it. A new album by Ray Davies has to be a special event, he recorded his last solo album, ‘Working Man’s Café’, almost a decade ago, while the Kinks haven’t released anything new since 1994.

Davies recently shared, via NPR, the first glimpse of his upcoming record, ‘Poetry’ a jangling-guitar-filled song with that charming Kinks delivery that always reminds me about a Wes Anderson movie. The song was recorded with Minesota’s favorites, The Jayhawks, which partly explains this half-happy half-melancholic vibe, while the song has a strong sing-along hook, as you would expect coming from such rock and roll first class heroes.

In a way, it is fascinating that Ray Davies, at 72, is still making new music that sounds so fresh while the lyrics touch at America’s obsession with corporation, capitalism and materialism: ‘I kneel down and say grace for the comforts the world bestows on me / And the great corporations providing our every need / And those big neon signs telling us what to eat / And every shop window goods are designed to please / Oh but I ask / Where is the poetry?’

We may expect more of this in the other songs, since NPR reports that the album was inspired from ‘Americana the memoir’, which was dealing with The Kinks’ ban from America in the ’60s and Ray’s move to the this same country later in life.

‘Americana’, which was co-produced with Guy Massey and John Jackson, will be released on April 21st , and if you are a Davies fan, you are in for a treat as a second volume will reportedly be a released later this year. According to Ultimate Classic Rock, Davies had already mentioned this project 3 years ago, in an interview with Mojo, saying that this was ‘the biggest record project I’ve ever attempted. … It’s a real challenge. You adapt books into films and stage plays, but it’s very unusual to adapt a book into a record.’

The album also contains a series of spoken-word passages from his memoir, which may feel a bit odd, but Davies declared to Billboard he was ready to take some risks,:‘My catchphrase right now is ‘feel free to fail. Because you gotta try, even if you don’t succeed. At least you tried. That was my approach with the Kinks, and it paid off for the most part.”

Here is ‘Americana’ Tracklist:

‘Americana’
‘The Deal’
‘Poetry’
‘Message From The Road’
‘A Place In Your Heart’
‘The Mystery Room’
‘Silent Movie’
‘Rock ‘N’ Roll Cowboys’
‘Change For Change’
‘The Man Upstairs’
‘I’ve Heard That Beat Before’
‘A Long Drive Home To Tarzana’
‘The Great Highway’
‘The Invaders’
‘Wings Of Fantasy’