The Kinks to Release Retrospective Comp With Liner Notes by David Bowie, Reissue Muswell Hillbillies

The Kinks have announced a series of archival releases in honor of the 50th anniversary of their first singles. David Bowie will write the liner notes for the two-disc retrospective The Essential Kinks, out via Legacy on October 14.

“I’ve never heard a Kinks song that I didn’t like,” Bowie wrote in the liner notes. “Of course, from their noisy and brash beginnings, the Kinks have come to stand for some of the most enduring and heart-clutching pop of all time. They are in the gut of every British song-writer who followed them and are indisputably a cornerstone of everything pop and rock. I love ‘em. The world loves ‘em.” Check out the tracklist for the compilation here.

Legacy will also release an expanded, remastered reissue of 1971′s Muswell Hillbillies on November 10. It appends nine bonus tracks to the original album, along with a DVD of TV appearances from 1972 that were never released in North America. You can check out the tracklist here. It will be followed by a double LP vinyl reissue later this year. 

On September 9, Legacy Recordings digitally released remastered versions of 16 Kinks albums. That batch included every studio album from Muswell Hillbillies to 1984′s Word of Mouth, along with the 1976 greatest hits album Celluloid Heroes, the live album One for the Road from 1980, Ray Davies’ 1985 solo album Return to Waterloo, and the 1986 two-disc compilation album Come Dancing With the Kinks/The Best of the Kinks 1977-86.

Earlier this year, the Kinks discussed the possibility of reuniting.

Watch the Kinks perform “Muswell Hillbilly” in 1972:

Comments are closed.