The Kinks "Face To Face" Pye Records NPL 18149 Mono LP 1st UK Press 1966 A2/B1
£
25
$
33
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Description
The Kinks ? "Face To Face" Pye Records ?– NPL 18149 UK 1st Mono Pressing. Vinyl LP released in November 1966 in a laminated Garrod and Lofthouse (patent pending) ''flipback'' cover on a plum Pye label.
The vinyl has clearly been used and has lots of surface marks which do produce some background noise in quieter passages and between tracks. It plays all the way through without any hop, skip or jump (at least on my Dansette). The sleeve has a 1 1/2" tear to the top right on the front but is otherwise in good condition given that it's 50 years old! Writing on the spine is completely legible.
"Face to Face" is the Kinks' fourth studio album, released in October 1966. The album had marked the band's shift from the hard-driving style of beat music, catapulting them to international acclaim. It was also their first album consisting entirely of Ray Davies' compositions and it has also been regarded by critics as rock's first concept album.
Ray Davies suffered a nervous breakdown just prior to the major recording sessions for the album. The new style of writing began gradually the previous year with compositions such as "A Well Respected Man" and "Dedicated Follower of Fashion" and in May 1966 with the hit single "Sunny Afternoon", which reached #1 in the UK. This song's great popularity proved to Ray and the Kinks' managers that the group could find success with this style of song-writing. The new album would follow this pattern, as would the group's recorded output for the next five years. The 1966–71 period inaugurated by this album would later be called Ray's and the Kinks' "golden age".
Rock historians have credited the album as arguably one of the first rock/pop concept albums, with the loose common theme of social observation. In the album's original inception, Ray attempted to bridge the songs together with sound effects, but was forced to revert to the more standard album format by Pye Records before the album's release.
The album was released in a particularly tumultuous year for the band, with personnel problems (Pete Quaife was injured; he resigned and later rejoined the band), legal and contractual battles and an ongoing hectic touring schedule. The album was critically well received, but did not sell particularly well at the time of its release (especially in the United States), and was out of print for many years.
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