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  • 21 Aug, 2019

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Polly (The Kinks Song)
"Polly" (titled "Pretty Polly" on early singles) is a song by the English rock band the Kinks. It was released on a non-album single in April 1968, as the B-side to "Wonderboy". Written and sung by bandleader Ray Davies, the song was recorded in March 1968 during sessions for the band's 1968 album The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society. Ray was initially inspired by the character Polly Garter in Dylan Thomas's 1954 radio drama Under Milk Wood, though his resulting character does not share anything with Thomas's besides the same name. The song is one of the few Kinks recordings from the late 1960s to possibly feature real strings, as arranged by David Whitaker.

Background and composition

Ray Davies composed "Polly" in reference to the character Polly Garter from Welsh poet Dylan Thomas's 1954 radio drama Under Milk Wood. Ray briefly planned to write a suite of songs inspired by Thomas's drama, but the idea instead evolved into the Kinks' 1968 album The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society. Later commentators write that the Polly in Ray's song bears little resemblance to Thomas's character beyond having the same name. In Thomas's drama, Polly Garter is a promiscuous unmarried woman who cares for her many illegitimate children, while in Ray's song, she is a party girl.

I knew a girl who was like that. She ran [the Kinks'] first fan club. She died of junk.

– Ray Davies on "Polly", 1984

Band biographer Andy Miller suggests Ray instead drew his idea for the character from the woman who ran the Kinks' fan club before she died of a heroin overdose. In addition, he writes that the name parallels Pretty Polly, an English brand of women's stockings. Author Nick Hasted connects "Polly" to the woman addressed in Ray's song "Starstruck", while author Thomas M. Kitts writes the song is one of several by Ray about "crushed female innocence", including "Little Miss Queen of Darkness" (1966), "Big Black Smoke" (1966) and "Monica" (1968). Author Patricia Gordon Sullivan characterises the song as another of Ray's written in the tradition of music hall.

Recording and release

The Kinks likely recorded "Polly" in March 1968 during the sessions for The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society. Recording took place in Pye Studio 2, one of two basement studios at Pye Records' London offices. Ray is credited as the song's producer. The four-track mixing console was operated by one of Pye's in-house engineers, either Alan MacKenzie or Brian Humphires. Supplementing the Kinks' regular line-up was Ray's wife Rasa Davies, who contributed backing vocals, and the band's regular session keyboard Nicky Hopkins, who played piano. "Polly" is one of a few songs recorded during the Village Green sessions to possibly feature a real string section, a rarity on the Kinks' late 1960s recordings since Pye executives saw the hiring of an arranger and string players as too expensive to warrant. English composer David Whitaker likely arranged the strings.

In the last week of March 1968, Ray selected "Polly" to be the B-side of the Kinks' next single, "Wonderboy". Pye rush released the single in the UK on 5 April 1968. A reviewer in Record Mirror magazine wrote that in contrast to its A-side, "Polly" is "more rhythmic, maybe with moments of crashingness", and helped provide the single with value-for-money. Reprise Records issued the single in the US on 15 or 22 May 1968. Both sides of the single failed to chart in either the US or UK. In the UK, it sold around 26,000 copies, roughly one-tenth of the Kinks' singles from the previous year, "Waterloo Sunset" and "Autumn Almanac".

Though Ray did not include "Polly" on Village Green, when the Kinks' US recording contract required them to submit a new album to Reprise in June 1968, it was among the fifteen tracks he sent to the label. The song featured on the label's test pressings of the album, planned for a late 1968 release in the US as Four More Respected Gentlemen, though the project was ultimately abandoned. It has since been included on compilation albums like The Kink Kronikles (1972) and Kollectables (1984) and as a bonus track on CD reissues of Something Else by the Kinks (1998) and Village Green (2004).

Personnel

According to band researcher Doug Hinman:

The Kinks

Additional musicians

Notes

  1. ^ Miller thinks the name may have been a subtle joke, because "[i]f Polly's are the legs on the advertising hoardings, it explains why ... she is such a hit with the fellas".
  2. ^ In Doug Hinman and Jason Brabazon's 1994 self-published Kinks discography, they date the recording to late 1967 or early 1968. Later authors like Miller (2003) cite Hinman & Brabazon's book to provide the same dating. In his 2004 book, Hinman updated his dating to "probably" March 1968.

References

Citations

  1. ^ Miller 2003, p. 112.
  2. ^ Miller 2003, p. 112; Rogan 1998, p. 20; Hinman 2004, p. 111.
  3. ^ Rogan 1998, p. 20.
  4. ^ Kitts 2002, p. 134.
  5. ^ Rogan 2015, p. 677; Miller 2003, p. 112
  6. ^ Kitts 2008, p. 116.
  7. ^ Hasted 2011, p. 128.
  8. ^ Miller 2003, pp. 111–112.
  9. ^ Sullivan 2002, p. 99.
  10. ^ Hinman 2004, p. 111.
  11. ^ Hinman & Brabazon 1994, quoted in Miller 2003, pp. 111, 146.
  12. ^ Miller 2003, pp. 111, 146.
  13. ^ Hinman 2004, pp. 111, 112.
  14. ^ Hinman 2004, pp. 111, 121.
  15. ^ Miller 2003, pp. 21, 76–77.
  16. ^ Hinman 2004, p. 121.
  17. ^ Miller 2003, p. 21.
  18. ^ Hinman 2004, p. 112.
  19. ^ Miller 2003, p. 79n22.
  20. ^ Hinman 2004, pp. 112, 114.
  21. ^ Hinman 2004, pp. 115, 116.
  22. ^ Miller 2003, p. 31n4.
  23. ^ Hinman 2004, p. 116; Miller 2003, p. 31n4.
  24. ^ Jovanovic 2013, pp. 311, 319; Marten & Hudson 2007, pp. 193, 275.

Sources

  • Hasted, Nick (2011). The Story of the Kinks: You Really Got Me. London: Omnibus Press. ISBN 978-1-84938-660-9.
  • Hinman, Doug; Brabazon, Jason (1994). You Really Got Me: An Illustrated World Discography of the Kinks, 1964–1993. Rumford, Rhode Island: Doug Hinman. ISBN 978-0-9641005-1-0.
  • Hinman, Doug (2004). The Kinks: All Day and All of the Night: Day by Day Concerts, Recordings, and Broadcasts, 1961–1996. San Francisco, California: Backbeat Books. ISBN 978-0-87930-765-3.
  • Jovanovic, Rob (2013). God Save the Kinks: A Biography. London: Aurum Press. ISBN 978-1-84513-671-0.
  • Kitts, Thomas M. (2002). "'... in the grand [and not so grand] tradition': Film, Theatre, and the Triumph of 20th Century Man". In Kitts, Thomas M. (ed.). Living on a Thin Line: Crossing Aesthetic Borders with The Kinks. Rumford, Rhode Island: Desolation Angel Books. pp. 131–142. ISBN 0-9641005-4-1.
  • Kitts, Thomas M. (2008). Ray Davies: Not Like Everybody Else. New York City: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-97768-5.
  • Marten, Neville; Hudson, Jeff (2007). The Kinks: A Very English Band. London: Bobcat Books. ISBN 978-0-8256-7351-1.
  • Miller, Andy (2003). The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society. 33⅓ series. New York City: Bloomsbury Academic. ISBN 978-0-8264-1498-4.
  • Rogan, Johnny (1998). The Complete Guide to the Music of the Kinks. London: Omnibus Press. ISBN 978-0-7119-6314-6.
  • Rogan, Johnny (2015). Ray Davies: A Complicated Life. London: The Bodley Head. ISBN 978-1-84792-317-2.
  • Sullivan, Patricia Gordon (2002). "'Let's Have a Go at It': The British Musical Hall and The Kinks". In Kitts, Thomas M. (ed.). Living on a Thin Line: Crossing Aesthetic Borders with The Kinks. Rumford, Rhode Island: Desolation Angel Books. pp. 80–99. ISBN 0-9641005-4-1.
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