Music Banter - what nothing about Gangnam Style

Quote:

Originally Posted by Urban Hat€monger ? (Post 1276688)

I think most of that was because they were barred from entering the country at the peak of their career. After that happened they kind of stopped bothering to attempt to break over there.

Going off topic for a second...

Although The Kinks are now mainly part of Rock and Roll's Classic Era in The US thanks to their early string of hits or the band I have to remind Van Halen listeners as to who did the original version of "You Really Got Me", I'd replace The Kinks and say The Jam instead for being an iconic British band that has been ignored in the US, with Paul Weller being totally non-existent Stateside with the exception of a small devoted cult following.

In fact, when The Kinks regained their rights to tour The States in 1969, I'm sure that they were happy that at least Reprise was seriously promoting Village Green, Arthur, and Lola vs. The Powerman and the Money-Go-Round. Even though Village Green was a chart miss, the label had a God Save The Kinks promotion which was cheesy but still amusing and helpful with the growing number of FM Rock stations in a time before the real Money-Go-Round seriously invaded that industry. Arthur and Lola dented the US album charts where Pye proved that they were mainly single minded as both albums only sold to the seriously faithful.

The Kinks' move to RCA had some great music but had very little support for the concepts. Despite the setbacks, they were regulars on the US touring circuit, and "Celluloid Heroes" was a serious FM radio hit. Being a kid from that time, I do remember all of the major FM Rock stations in my area playing at least that song.

By the time they moved to Arista, they made albums that sounded like that they were made for The US - a few steps lower in quality than Village Green of course, but still solid when all was said and done. After a string of Top 50 albums (Sleepwalker being Top 30), Low Budget was the perfect FM Radio album, with "Gallon of Gas" the song a lot of listeners related to in a time when gas was rising up in price (although still under a Dollar!). One For the Road had a Laserdisc to help promote (Pioneer from what I remember being the company who released the video) and versions of "Lola" and "You Really Got Me" which helped.

Give the People What They Want (humm...interesting choice for an album title!) and State of Confusion furthered their US sales for the third and last round of US success for The Kinks. "Destroyer" was a major FM Radio hit and both were Top 20 albums with the latter's "Come Dancing" the attraction for the 1983 success. It was with Word of Mouth in '84 and the mainstream's interest with the growing Hair Metal scene and the rise of other over-hyped Rock musicians that The Kinks went back to being Cult Status in the US.

You can say that Mainstream America ignored them after 1984.

With The Jam and Paul Weller, the only major US success was with Style Council's My Ever Changing Moods and title single. That's it.