THE KINKS – “Tired Of Waiting For You”
Pure mood – a boy, an absence, a wait. There’s barely a context, only the most abstract of frames, all that really lingers is the melancholy chorus, and this gives the single a mystique that the better-known songs around it maybe lack. Before I came to play the song back this morning I was convinced it was a good deal more psychedelic than it is – I remembered exotic instruments, tricksy studio play. They don’t exist but it has some of the lazy, half-dreamt feel of English psychedelia. The bubble is popped for me by Davies’ curiously flat, nasal voice – he’s never a singer I’ve particularly enjoyed but he’s usually much more expressive and convincing than this.
6
The sighing sublime mood changing melodic bit ‘Its your life and you can do what you want’ is the winning thing for me on this-a real trademark of Ray Davies’ writing..He does a similar thing on Days ‘I wish today could be tommorow’…8
I knew this from a comp before the Guinness book existed, and was more than surprised to discover it was a no.1.
I agree, it is all about mood, and the flat delivery – sung through gritted teeth over that pissed-off two-note riff – adds to the atmosphere of monotonous misery: Ray outside the cinema, freezing his ass off, waiting on a girl who’s late again (and eventually turns up with a faint, suspicious whiff of Old Spice about her). Anger threatens to spill out on the slightly growled “cos I’m sooo tired” on the very last chorus, but otherwise it’s a master class in restraint. Lonely soul Ray content to put up with being treated shabbily (“It’s your life…”) cos this bad girl’s better than no girl.
Erm,
where’s the rest of the comments? One of the best songs of sixties and this is only the third comment.
It’s a 9, btw.
It’s in the FAQ – loads of the early 60s comments got wiped back in 2005 unfortunately. I don’t remember a particular debate around this one, though 6 looks a little harsh I agree.
Davies totally succeeds in painting that mental picture of waiting for a girl, with economic aplomb. He doesn’t need to fill in the gaps or join the dots. We do that ourselves, cos we’ve all been there, right? It’s a deadpan delivery because it has to be.
Simple, yet effective.
#5- completely agree about the economy of it. as a child familiarizing myself with all the “British Invasion” groups through oldies radio, the kinks always intrigued me because i knew they were holding back. with groups like the hollies, gerry, searchers, etc – though some were very good, what you see is what you got. with the kinks (and the zombies’ “she’s not there”) there was something else happening behind the curtain that thrilled me.
TOTPWatch: The Kinks thrice performed ‘Tired Of Waiting For You’ on Top Of The Pops;
21 January 1965. Also in the studio that week were; Brian Poole & The Tremeloes, Cilla Black, Del Shannon, Gerry & The Pacemakers, Manfred Mann and Sounds Orchestral. Jimmy Saville was the host.
18 February 1965. Also in the studio that week were; Billy J Kramer & The Dakotas, Roy Orbison, Sandie Shaw, The Hollies and The Ivy League. David Jacobs was the host.
25 December 1965. Also in the studio that Christmas were; Georgie Fame & The Blue Flames, Jackie Trent, The Hollies, The Seekers, The Walker Brothers and Unit 4 + 2. Jimmy Saville, Alan Freeman, Pete Murray & David Jacobs were the hosts.
None of these editions survives.