Kinks - God's Children

(Pye, 1971)

The oft-ignored Percy soundtrack doesn’t get much love from the people of this world, but the Hott XXX Secret I’m gonna tell you now is that it’s actually filled to bustin’ with terrific songs in the basic mold of the Lola LP’s gentler moments. Ignoring the instrumental throwaways that pad out the record, these are mature, thoughtful, well-produced weepies that stand up as some of the strongest ballads Ray Davies ever recorded. “God’s Children” is the best of them, a rousing, string-filled syrup-fest that makes the same “back to nature” case as “Apeman,” but does it successfully and gorgeously, without the smirky, braindead hokiness that sabotaged the earlier track. An excellent song, and it’s almost matched by “Moments” on the B-side, a fragile hanky-honker that sounds quite a bit like something Paul McCartney might have recorded around the same time (especially when the brief guitar solo begins). Man. YOU WERE SO GOOD AT YOUR JOB BACK THEN, RAY DAVIES. And! Sweetening the deal here is the fact that the German wing of Pye Records offers yet another picture sleeve that kicks the ass of your eyeball, making for an absolute winner of a package. But still: Buy the entire album – both songs are on there – and thrill to the last of the classy, subdued, “sixties-sounding” Kinks records. Things were to get pretty rough after this…