The Kinks - "A Rock n Roll Fantasy": C/D

Destroy: that people always think I'm talking about the Bad Company song.

Hrm, it seems that the album it comes from also contains "Black Messiah," which has more or less racist lyrics.

Everybody got the right to speak their mind
So don't shoot me for saying mine
Everybody talking about racial equality
'Cos everybody's equal in the good Lord's eyes
But if I told you that God was black
What would you think of that
I bet you wouldn't believe it

There's a self made prophet living right next to me
He said the Black Messiah's gonna come and set the whole world free
He looked at me with his evil eye and prophesied
And he really believed it

He said a Black Messiah is gonna set the world on fire
And he no liar, 'cos he has truly heard the word
Everybody talk about racial equality
But I'm the only honky living on an all black street
They knock me down 'cos they brown and I white
Like you wouldn't believe it

They say a Black Messiah is gonna set the world on fire
A Black Messiah is gonna come and rule the world
Everybody talk about racial equality
Everybody talk about equal rights
But white's white, black's black and that's that
Everybody got the right to speak their mind
So don't shoot me for saying mine

Everybody talking about racial equality
You hear everybody talking about equal rights
But white's white, black's black and that's that
And that's the way you should leave it

Don't want no Black Messiah to come and set the world on fire
A Black Messiah is gonna come and rule the world
Everybody got to show a little give and take
Everybody got to live with a little less hate
Everybody gotta work it out, we gotta sort it out
Everybody got the right to speak their mind
So don't shoot me for saying mine

check where applicable

General forms
Racism · Sexism · Ageism
Religious intolerance
Xenophobia
Hate group


Specific forms
Social
Homophobia · Ableism · Disablism · Adultism
Misogyny · Misandry · Gerontophobia
Lookism · Sizeism · Classism · Elitism


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Arabs
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Canadians
Catholics
Chinese

Christians

Europeans
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Iranians
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Polish
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Genocide · Holocaust · Pogrom
Ethnocide · Ethnic cleansing · Race war
Religious persecution · Gay bashing


Movements
Discriminatory
Aryanism · Neo-Nazism · Supremacism
Fundamentalism · Kahanism
Anti-discriminatory
Abolitionism · Civil rights · Gay rights
Women's/Universal suffrage · Men's rights
Children's rights · Youth rights
Disability rights · Autistic rights


Policies
Discriminatory
Segregation: Racial/Ethnic/Religious/Sexual
Apartheid · Redlining · Internment
Anti-discriminatory
Emancipation · Civil rights · Desegregation
Integration · Reservation · Reparations
Affirmative action · Racial quota


Law
Discriminatory
Anti-miscegenation · Anti-immigration
Alien and Sedition Acts · Nuremberg Laws
Jim Crow laws · Black codes · Apartheid laws
Anti-discriminatory
List of anti-discrimination acts

Other forms
Nepotism · Cronyism
Colorism · Regionalism · Linguicism
Ethnocentrism · Triumphalism
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Economic discrimination


Related topics
Prejudice · Supremacism · Intolerance
Tolerance · Diversity · Multiculturalism
Political correctness · Reverse discrimination
Eugenics · Racialism
Classic Rockism

So, "A Rock n Roll Fantasy," then?

I love this... I love misfits too, and quite a bunch from the early '70s.

The Kinks were the first band I was into when I was a little kid (well, after the Wombles and so on), and I guess I listened to them too much and can't really listen to the '60s Kinks much nowadays, so '70s Kinks I can appreciate, because I didn't know it back them (except for the famous ones).

Misfits was the last good Kinks album in my book, there are a couple good songs on Give The People What They Want

The cod-reggae thythm on "black Messiah" is more offensive than the dumb lyircs. ez to skip.

Misfits was the last good Kinks album in my book
My book too. In addition to the songs already mentioned, it had some good Ray humorous slice-of-life observational songs like "Hay Fever" and "Permanent Wave" and a good Dave rocker in "Live Life." The success of their subsequent arena rock phase kind of bummed me out.

"Arthur" was the last good Kinks album in my book.

"Lola Vs. The Powerman" was OK at times, but kind of patchy. And the rest? Boring Americanized rock'n'roll, far from what The Kinks were about during their 1965-69 heyday.

The 'z', I suppose is the funny bit.

However, whilst I know what you mean, Geir, I don't think this can be applied to all of it. So the likes of Muswell Hillbillies, despite having its country connection, is still to me, certainly rooted in London (Muswell Hill!). The track we're talking about here talks of 'a guy on my block', well, or something like that, which again, seems very British, right through to the likes of Come Dancing, which doesn't have an American bone in its body. The Kinks certainly had an angle to what they did in the late '70s/early '80s that was 'americanised', but not much in the grand scheme of things, I would say.

Interesting that your key Kinks period doesn't go back to 1963.

I've also never heard the 'prog' records they put out 1973/74, so couldn't comment there.

I always think the Dan of this song is the fanboy doppelgänger of Danny, the protagonist of the dBs's "Amplifier."

Interesting that your key Kinks period doesn't go back to 1963.

The first singles were plain and simple R&B, although there were tracks on the first album ("Stop Your Sobbing") that were pointing towards the more sophisticated approach of alter.