Kinks Weeks – Around The Dial … mostlymusiccovers.com

Randy has been writing a blog about Cover Songs, music genres, and artists since early 2018. He moved to WordPress in February of 2022 and has found a welcoming community of music enthusiasts. You can read about the origins of Rock and Roll, Blues, R&B, and Country Music. There are Cover Song and Chart statistics as well, all with a focus on the 1950s, 60s, and 70s at MostlyMusicCovers.com. He has also helped me out with blues artists and Canadian Charts in general! 

This is the opening track on the 1981 album Give the People What They Want. It was written by Ray Davies of course. It was not one of the three singles they released off the album, but it may be my favorite track. Max told me this was the opening song when he saw them on tour in ’83. I have not made sufficient effort to see them. This does not mean I am not a fan, as we can’t attend many of the performances we would like to.

As you might guess the song is focused on the radio dial and the words are quite prophetic, I think. The lyrics speak of the protagonist’s frustration in not being able to find their favorite DJ. Hence going “Around the Dial” and searching in vain. While there are slightly differing interpretations, I had not read anywhere quoting Ray himself on what he was saying when he wrote it. From what I hear in the song and things I have read, this is my take on the song.

The protagonist’s speculation involves questions. Had the DJ said or done something to upset the ‘Corporation’? The song sets the theme for the album, as the lead track, it ties in nicely with the overall message of Give the People What They Want. In other words, don’t try and silence my favorite DJ just for telling it like it is. Let us listen to what we want to listen to.

I said prophetic because this was the beginning of increased pressure on the local DJ. While this was not the first such song, it is reminiscent of Elvis Costello who warned of corporate control over what we see and hear in his song “Radio, Radio” in 1978. Ray Davies took it to the grassroots level of the listener and the radio DJ. This was before (in the US) the Telecommunications Act in 1996 which saw the buying up/combining of stations and the closure of some 1,000 operations by 1999.

Meanwhile, soon to come we had Internet, Digital, and Satellite Radio. Not to mention Podcasts and Streaming Services. This all changed the way we listen worldwide.

Yet despite all this competition music radio stations have been surprisingly resilient. Stations don’t have to store thousands of records and CDs, everything is digital, and they can access anything.  Ray asks us, “We’re going ’round the dial, (Are you listening) Around the dial”? Yes Mr. Davies we are still listening.

Around The Dial

The radios of the world are tuning in tonight
Are you on the dial? Are you tuned in right?
One of our D.J.’s is missing

Are you listening?
Are you listening to me?
Can you hear me?
Can you hear me clearly?
Around the dial

I’ve been around the dial so many times
But you’re not there
Somebody tells me that you’ve been taken off the air
Well, you were my favorite D.J.
Since I can’t remember when
You always played the best records
You never followed any trend

F.M., A.M.. Where are you?
You gotta be out there somewhere on the dial
On the dial

(Are you ready?) We’re going ’round the dial
(Are you listening?) Around the dial
(Are you tuned in?) Around the dial
(Are you searching?) Around the dial

F.M., A.M.. Where are you?
You gotta be out there somewhere on the dial
On the dial

Where did you go Mr. D.J.?
Did they take you off the air?
Was it something that you said to the corporation guys upstairs?
It wasn’t the pressure
You never sounded down
It couldn’t be the ratings
You had the best in town

Somehow I’m gonna find you, track you down
Gonna keep on searching
Around and around and ’round and ’round…

(They’re searching) Around the dial
(They’re listening) Around the dial
(Poor station) The best in town
(Poor D.J.) Who never let us down

While the critics kept on knocking you
You just kept on rocking ’round the dial
Around the dial

I’ve been searching for you on my radio
This time your station really must have gone underground
Somebody said you had a minor nervous breakdown
Was it something that you heard
Or something that you saw
That made you lose your mind
Did you lose control
Did you step out of line?
If you’re there, give us a sign

I can’t believe that you’ve been taken off the air
Think I’ll sell my radio now that you’re not there
You never gave in to fashion
You never followed any trends
All the record bums tried to hack you up
But you were honest to the end

Gonna keep my radio on
‘Til I know just what went wrong
The answer’s out there somewhere on the dial
On the dial

Can you hear me? (around the dial)
Are you listening? (around the dial)
Are you out there? (around the dial)
Can you hear me?
Around the dial

…

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

51 thoughts on “Kinks Weeks – Around The Dial … mostlymusiccovers.com”

  1. Typical of a Kinks song- good lyrics & tune! I thought ‘Destroyer’ was all I knew on that album, but turns out this one was familiar too. Like you say, prophetic. DJs used to have personalities & would be part of the reason you’d tune in, but by a decade after this on most stations they were just merely people reading short scripts given them. Not long after that, robots & centralized syndicated script-readers replaced most of them even. A shame. But a good song!

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    1. You may have heard of Better Things and Art Lover…both were played off this album. It’s my favorite of the 80s albums…it’s the first real time Kinks album I bought so naturally I’m gonig to like it a lot.
      Yea those were the good days for sure. I did tune in for the different DJ’s and had my favorites….now no local flavor.

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      1. it definitely is hard to find. The DJs with personalities and some interest in what they actually play have migrated to the internet or satellite by and large. I remember back, probably as far back as 2006, going to a radio station live remote thing in a stereo store, I knew the DJ (I knew most of them on the local rock station for awhile) so I hung out with him for a bit . They had the station cranked up in store of course, and at one point he asks me ‘What song is this?’ He had no idea what his own ‘show’ was playing. Then he showed me the (I’m sure confidential) papers he had, one with a list of every song they played that afternoon – in advance – then the breaks where he had to call in and , the page of exactly what he was to say word for word each time he ‘took the mic’. Pretty stifling for a creative type.

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    3. Gawd Dave, that ‘DJ by rote’ story is downright soul destroying. Yes, we all had our faves to follow, mine was someone lost in the 60s, a Glen/Glenn Roach. Now theres an apt last name for a 60’s DJ.

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  2. Damn, that live version is a pretty kicking track.Sometimes the more things change they stay the same. There are still some stations left old school style around the dial Randy…. Cool writeup!

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  4. Great way to kick off the week(s)! An old friend was a DJ. He started in free-form FM (which later became “AOR” (“album-oriented rock”). In free-form, DJs acquired a following by demonstrating their taste in music and their ability to create interesting sets so you heard what you wanted to hear and also learned new things.

    He eventually landed at a corporate-controlled, computer-programmed station in San Diego. An algorithm chose the music. His “freedom” was to choose the order of the songs he was ordered to play. When folks called in requests, he was required to say, “We’ll see if we can get to that”. He couldn’t admit he had no control over what he played. Since folks often requested currently popular songs that were in heavy rotation, they were often fooled into thinking he had responded to their requests.

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    1. That is sad…that must have been hard for him to go from there to controlled enviroment.
      I would tune in to hear local DJ’s as they talked about the area as well.

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  6. Well – this is a new one on me. (You’ll see where I sit on The Kinks issue in the coming week or so 😉.)

    I love it though. Ray Davies channeling his inner punk, it sounds like.

    in fact I have say I’d never have guessed this was The Kinks had I not been told. Perhaps they were too versatile for their own good?

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    1. i know it well becasue this was the first album I bought by them real time. This album probably is the most punk they were… the title track especially.

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  8. Have never heard this song before, but I agree with the sentiment in the lyrics. When I was a teenager, I fantasized of becoming a radio DJ, but never pursued it or took any broadcasting courses. The way corporate media conglomerates took over most radio stations – not to mention many TV stations and newspapers – is a real tragedy.

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      1. Randy,I feel the same about myself on the DJ front.

        My big brother wound up on a local station that was having a ‘You be our DJ for half an hour’ competition,’ he never won it but did get to the last three or four. Instant local celebrity, or at least he was for half the summer. Just what a gawky, spotty-faced, voice half-broken kid brother needs, all the pretty girls flocking to talk to my silver-tongued brother.

        Oh yeah, it wasn’t just Dave Davies who had a simmering resentment of his bigger bro at the time!

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      4. Glyn sorry if I wasn’t clear on it. THANK YOU for sharing this link!!!! Actually seeing (and hearing) JP introduce them on the video confirms he’s the one interview Clapton (only Clapton!) on the disc I have. Also, that website looks very valuable and has been bookmarked. JP is a superstar in the world of music journalism. Thanks again, Glyn.

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  10. It’s odd responding on my own blog lol… like you said this was the opening song to one of the best concerts I’ve seen…I would probably put it at the top. When I got the album this is one of the first ones I really liked. Thanks Randy for doing this.

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  12. Randy, you made me think of the pirate radio ship in England. I saw a movie on it awhile back and the attempts made to shut them down. Music listening has changed so much as you detail here. Nice write up, and thank you for introducing me to a new Kinks song.

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      1. I’ll wait and see if one of the lesser known tracks I love pops up. As Frank-N-Furter might say ‘I’ll wait and shiver with antici………………….pation.”

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  16. Great song! This was the first Kinks record I had in my collection – truth be told, I made a bootleg copy on cassette from my cousin’s copy. I was only 12/13 at the time and hadn’t quite yet discovered punk or the British New Wave bands, but this record certainly got me primed for that music which would utterly consume me within another year or two!

    And yes, like everyone else here, I miss “real” rock and roll radio and my favorite DJ’s!! The 70’s and 80’s were still the Wild West on the radio waves compared to what passes for radio entertainment nowadays!

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    1. This was the first real time Kinks album I had as well man. This album had rock and punk kinda mixed especially the title track.
      Oh yes…I miss our local DJ’s….I still hope one day it will come back independently.

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  17. I’d never heard this before. I’m excited by the fact that most seem to have gone for lesser-known, later tracks from the 70s and 80s (maybe a North American bias, as the Kinks were almost bigger there than the UK at the time, in a reversal from the 60s…)

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    1. The ones starting off do cover the later ones and then we start getting into everything…I have to say…all the eras are covered and still 3 of their largest hits are not.

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