Ned,
I love the Kinks. I have Kinks Kinkspirisy and their very first eponymous album.
A fine band.

@1,
Whoops!I meant to say I have Kink Kontroversy not Kinkspirisy. My bad.

The stalling of The Kinks career has a lot to do with the Musician Union banning them from touring in the States for a number of years after one of the brothers punched a union rep backstage.

@3 -- Yeah, but I also think they would have struggled even if they toured more. During this period, they were loved by critics, but not by average listeners. With some notable exceptions, they lacked hits that you could play on the radio. Even when they had a song that was a hit, they weren't interested in building an album around that idea. Davies made it clear he wasn't going to write another "Waterloo Sunset", nor was he going to write heavy medal works either. He was focused on concept albums, and the statement it was going to make, regardless of the commercial success.

It wasn't until they signed with Arista, and changed styles once again that they had a lot of commercial success again. Low Budget was their most popular album, and it is easy see why, in my opinion. It is full of in your face rockers, but with plenty of interesting slower gems to mix it up (the percussion on "National Health" is fantastic). The albums from that period just make for better radio play, in my opinion (they are great tunes if you are trying to stay awake on the road).

I wanted to add to this but there are too many words—I'll just say goddamn I love the Kinks.

Love the Kinks! Loved Ray's storyteller shows I guess pushing 20 years ago now.