#1277: Till The End of The Day by The Kinks

Peak Month: May 1966
8 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #12
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #50
YouTube: “Till the End of the Day”
Lyrics: “Till the End of the Day”

The Kinks were an English rock band formed in 1963 in Muswell Hill, North London, by brothers Ray Davies and Dave Davies, Mick Avory, and Pete Quaife. Ray Davies was born in 1944 in London. He received a Spanish guitar for his 13th birthday. At the age of 18 he was a member of the Dave Hunt Rhythm & Blues Band, and also fronted the Ray Davies Quartet. Davies then joined the Hamilton King Band until June 1963. Dave Davies was born in London in 1947. He learned to play skiffle music, and later electric guitar. Peter Quaife was born in 1943 in Devon. He learned bass guitar in his teens and formed the Ravens with Ray and Dave Davies in 1963. 

The Kinks (then known as the Ramrods) spent summer 1963 supporting singer and future bodybuilding champion, Rick Wayne, on a tour of US airbases.

Bodybuilder Rick Wayne (1963) ahead of his wins at Mr. Universe and Mr. World in the mid-60s.

Ray and Dave Davies and Peter Quaife were joined by Mick Avory on drums, who was born in suburban London in 1944. Avory was a member of the band Bobby Angelo & the Tuxedos, who had a #30 hit in the UK with “Baby Sittin'” in August 1961. After leaving that group, he was asked twice to rehearse on drums at the Bricklayers Arms pub in London during late May-early June 1962 for a group of musicians who were later to become the Rolling Stones. Avory placed an advert in Melody Maker that was spotted by The Kinks management and after just one try out at the Camden Head pub in Islington Avory was hired. Within days of joining the Kinks Avory was on stage with them in an appearance on the British TV show Ready Steady Go!

Known as a British Invasion band in North America, the Kinks were one of the most significant and influential bands of the era. The Kinks first came to prominence in 1964 with their third single, “You Really Got Me” written by Ray Davies. It became an international hit peaking at #1 in the UK, #2 in Australia and New Zealand, #6 in Ireland, #7 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #8 in Sweden. In Canada the single reached #5 in Vancouver (BC) and Winnipeg (MB). Extremely influential on the American garage rock scene, “You Really Got Me” has been described as “a blueprint song in the hard rock and heavy metal arsenal. In 1965 the Kinks toured internationally headlining with other groups including Manfred Mann, The Honeycombs and The Yardbirds.

The next single release on the pop charts for the Kinks was “All Day And All Of The Night” which peaked at #2 in the UK, #7 on the Billboard Hot 100 and in Canada reached #3 in both Regina (SK) and Vancouver (BC). This single added a B Flat into the chord progression, but was otherwise similar in its musical structure to “You Really Got Me”. Both singles were uptempo power-chord, rock hits. Their next single, the more introspective “Tired Of Waiting For You”, also charted into the Top Ten at #1 in the South Africa and the UK, #3 in Ireland and Sweden, #6 in the USA and #3 in Vancouver (BC), and #4 in Chatham (ON) and Winnipeg (MB). In 1965 the Kinks toured internationally headlining with other groups including Manfred Mann, The Honeycombs and The Yardbirds. They had a Top Ten hit in the summer of 1965 with “Set Me Free” in Canada, the UK and Sweden.

The Kinks (1965)

While with the Kinks, Ray Davies wrote “Dandy” for Herman’s Hermits.

While Pye Records in the UK refused to release the song in the Kinks native country due to its sociological subject matter, “A Well Respected Man” charted to #1 in Sweden, #3 in Singapore, #6 in the Netherlands, #7 in South Africa, #8 in Malaysia, #11 in Australia, and #13 on the Billboard Hot 100. (Yes – “A Well Respected Man” did not chart in the UK due to discussion of class distinctions). In Canada “A Well Respected Man” had its best chart run in Hamilton (ON) at #3. “A Well Respected Man” was the first of five single releases with a British dance hall or vaudeville flavor over the next year.

The Kinks next single release was “Till The End Of The Day”.

Ray Davies told Ira Kaplan in a 2008 interview with Magnet Magazine about writing ‘Till the End of the Day.’

I remember how ‘Till the End of the Day’ came about. I had a bit of writer’s block, and my managers were getting worried because I hadn’t produced anything in almost a month. [Laughs] They sent Mort Shuman ’round to my house, one of my hit-writing heroes. He wrote “Save the Last Dance For Me” with Doc Pomus. This mad, druggy New Yorker came ’round to my little semi-detached house in London. He said, ‘I’m here to find out what you’re thinking about. I’m not interested in what you have written; I’m interested in what you’re gonna write.’ He was completely pee’d off by my managers to say it. I thought it was ridiculous that there was so much importance put on it. If I don’t want to write for a month, I won’t. To say the least, I was pressured into doing it. Then I went off to stay with my sister and bought a new toy, a little upright piano, and wrote ‘Till The End Of The Day.’

Of the song’s meaning, Davies said, “That song was about freedom, in the sense that someone’s been a slave or locked up in prison. It’s a song about escaping something. I didn’t know it was about my state of mind.” Davies also stated the song was a power rock song in the style of their first number-one hit, “You Really Got Me”, from 1964. Billboard described the “Till the End of the Day” as a “rockin’ dance beat wailer with up-beat lyric”. Music industry magazine Cash Box described the single as a “rollicking, fast-moving, bluesy romancer about a fella who is especially hung-up on his gal.”

“Till the End of the Day” was a track from the album The Kink Kontroversy. This was the last album prior to the shift to British Dance Hall and baroque pop that was featured in future hits like “Dedicated Follower of Fashion“, “Sunny Afternoon” and “Dead End Street“. This musical style was first showcased in “A Well Respected Man” in the winter of 1965-66. (“A Well Respected Man” charted best in Hamilton, Ontario, where it reached #3 on CKOC).

Till The End of the Day” peaked at #1 in Sweden, #4 in the Netherlands, #7 in Norway, #8 in the UK, and #19 in West Germany. In the USA the single stalled at #50 on the Billboard Hot 100.

In Canada and the USA, “Till the End of the Day” climbed to #2 in Sacramento (CA), #3 in Salt Lake City, #5 in Honolulu, and Oxnard (CA), #8 in Akron (OH), and #12 in Vancouver (BC). The single charted in only half the Canadian provinces and half the states in the USA.

The Kinks next hit was “Dedicated Follower of Fashion” which drew again from the British dance hall tradition. The Kinks next hit, “Sunny Afternoon” had a vaudevillian-themed arrangement took the band to #5 in Vancouver (BC). The single climbed to #1 in Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway, and the UK, #2 in New Zealand and Sweden, #3 in Denmark, #5 in Austria, #7 in Finland and West Germany, #10 in Spain, #11 in Belgium and France, #12 in Italy, #13 in Australia, and #14 on the Billboard Hot 100. In Canada the song reached #5 in Vancouver.

In the winter of 1966-67, the Kinks released “Dead End Street”. It climbed to #4 in the Netherlands, New Zealand and Sweden, #5 in West Germany, #6 in Norway, #7 in Ireland,#9 in Denmark, and #11 in Belgium. But in America the single stalled at #73. In Canada it was a Top Ten hit in Kitchener (ON), Orillia (ON), Toronto and Vancouver.

Meanwhile, in 1965 the Kinks went on tour in the USA and during the tour they had a dispute with the American Federation of Musicians. The dispute remained unresolved until 1969 when a ban was finally lifted on allowing them to perform in America. This ban on concert performance in the USA at a time of the height of their chart success elsewhere, contributed to the Kinks more modest chart performances in the USA.

The Kinks missed charting songs in North America for most of 1967, 1968 and 1969. Back in the UK the Kinks had three Top Ten hits in 1967: “Waterloo Sunset” (#3), “Death Of A Clown” (#3) and “Autumn Almanac” (#3). A final single at the end of the 60s was “Victoria” which became a Top Ten hit in Victoria (BC).

In 1970, the Kinks charted a #1 hit with “Lola” in 1970 in Vancouver. It peaked at number-one in Ireland, the Netherlands , New Zealand, and South Africa, #2 in Austria, Canada, Sweden, the UK and West Germany, #3 in Belgium, #4 in Switzerland, #6 in Australia and #9 on the Billboard Hot 100. The story about a woman named Lola who once in bed with a man is discovered, ‘herself’ to also be ‘a man’ was controversial for the time. The British Record Mirror slammed the song as a “Sex Change Record.” This was followed by a Top Ten hit called “Apeman”.

Peter Quaife left the Kinks in April 1970. Quaife resided in Denmark throughout the 1970s. He relocated to Belleville, (ON)  in 1980, and worked as a cartoonist and artist. He was diagnosed with kidney failure in 1998 and moved back to Denmark in 2005.

Ten studio albums followed the album featuring “Lola”. But none of these released between 1971 and 1981 produced no international Top 40 hits.

Years later the Kinks had a Top 20 hit in 1983 called “Come Dancing”. A followup single, “Don’t Forget To Dance” stalled at #29 on the Billboard Hot 100, #38 in New Zealand, and #58 in the UK. While in Vancouver (BC) the song reached #8. It was the Kinks last Top 40 hit.

In 1984, due to a personality conflict with Dave Davies, Mick Avory left the Kinks and was replaced by Bob Henrit (formerly of Unit 2+4 and Argent). In the 1990s, Avory formed Shut Up Frank. In the 2000s he was a member of the Kast-Off Kinks who released an album, Live at the Brook! in 2010.

A musical based on the early life of the Kinks frontman, Ray Davies, called Sunny Afternoon, continues to play at the Harold Pinter Theatre in London’s West End. The songs in the musical showcase songs by the Kinks during the peak of their career as part of the British Beat rock scene. In 2015 Sunny Afternoon won four awards at the UK’s 2015 Olivier Awards. These included an Olivier Award for Ray Davies for the Autograph Sound Award for Outstanding Achievement in Music. Davies wrote almost all of the songs for the Kinks and in addition to being rhythm guitarist he was the lead vocalist. Ray Davies had a huge influence on Pete Townsend of the Who, Morrissey and others.

Peter Quaife died in 2010 of kidney failure.

December 6, 2025
Ray McGinnis

References:
Ira Kaplan, “Ray Davies: Imaginary Man,” Magnet Magazine, June 1, 2008.
References:
About the Kinks – The Band, The Kinks.info.
Jovanovic, Rob. God Save the Kinks: A Biography. Aurum Press, London, UK, 2013.
Sunny Afternoon: The Hit Musical About The Kinks, Sunny Afternoon the Musical.com.
“The Kinks – Concerts, Canada,” setlist.fm.
Johnny Rogan, Ray Davies: A Complicated Life, (The Bodley Head, 2015).
Dave Laing, “Peter Quaife,” Guardian, June 27, 2010.
Mick Avory of The Kinks, Retrosellers, March 4, 2016.
C-Funtastic Fifty CFUN 1410-AM, Vancouver (BC) May 7, 1966