Kinks – Do It Again

Standing in the middle of nowhere
Wondering how to begin
Lost between tomorrow and yesterday
Between now and then

Great riff and rock song by the Kinks. It starts with a chord reminiscent of the A Hard Day’s Night intro.  I was in high school when it was released, and it was great to hear a guitar-driven song at that time on the radio. I remember our band following another band, and they did this song. I was jealous we didn’t get to it first. Do It Again was released in 1984 as the opening track on their album Word of Mouth. Written by lead singer Ray Davies

The band had a resurgence in the late seventies and early eighties with 3 straight albums in the top 20. They also had a top ten hit off of State of Confusion with Come Dancing. I bought my first real-time Kinks album in 1980 with Give The People What They Want. 

Working on their twentieth album Word of Mouth, conflicts between drummer Mick Avory and guitarist Dave Davies led to Avory’s leaving during the recording of the album. As a result, Avory played drums on just three tracks: Missing Persons, Sold Me Out, and Going Solo. The remaining tracks featured Bob Henrit on drums. Dysfunction seemed to fit this band and others like The Who and The Replacements. It made them who they were. Another song off of this album is the Dave Davies song Living On A Thin Line. The song grew in popularity when played repeatedly in The Sopranos third season episode University.

Ray Davies wrote this about the stressful working schedules the Kinks were going through. The song peaked at #41 on the Billboard 100 in 1984. I saw this line on a review of the song in Rolling Stone: The record kicks off with “Do It Again,” a tune that’s a love letter to every poor bastard out there grinding their teeth to dust in this cruel little hamster wheel of existence. I thought that fit well with this song. 

Ray Davies: The saddest day for me was when Mick left. Dave and Mick just couldn’t get along. There were terrible fights, and I got to the point where I couldn’t cope with it anymore. Push came to shove, and to avoid an argument I couldn’t face. … we were doing a track called “Good Day” and I couldn’t face having Mick and Dave in the studio, so I did it with a drum machine. Dave said he wanted to replace Mick, and … I took Mick out, and we got very, very drunk. We were in Guildford, and after about five pints of this wonderful scrumpy, Mick said if any other band offered him a tour, he wouldn’t take it, because he didn’t want to tour. And I remember him getting the train back – because he was banned from driving; it was a very bad year for Mick – and he walked to the station and disappeared into the mist.

Do It Again

Standing in the middle of nowhere
Wondering how to begin
Lost between tomorrow and yesterday
Between now and then

And now we’re back where we started
Here we go round again
Day after day I get up and I say
I better do it again

Where are all the people going
Round and round till we reach the end
One day leading to another
Get up go out do it again

Then it’s back where you started
Here we go round again
Back where you started
Come on do it again

And you think today is going to be better
Change the world and do it again
Give it all up and start all over
You say you will but you don’t know when

Then it’s back where you started
Here we go round again
Day after day I get up and I say
Come on better do it again

The days go by and you wish you were a different guy
Different friends and a new set of clothes
You make alterations and [a fact in you knows]
A new house a new car a new job a new nose
But it’s superficial and it’s only skin deep
Cause the voices in your head keep shouting in your sleep
Get back, get back

Back where you started, here we go round again
Back where you started, come on do it again

Back where you started, here we go round again
Day after day I get up and I say, do it agaiiinnn
Do it again
Day after day I get up and I say, do it again

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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.

31 thoughts on “Kinks – Do It Again”

  1. Pingback: Kinks – Do It Again – MobsterTiger

  2. Love Ray’s plaid suit on the live video. Good song. Too bad after all those years together, they still couldn’t figure out how to peacefully coexist.

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    1. Yea…it just came to a head during this album. I’ve read where Mick said he was done with touring anyway…so it was coming.

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  3. Great song, Max. “Do It Again” definitely is among my favorite Kinks songs from the ’80s. BTW, thanks for the link to my previous post on “Living On a Thin Line,” another track from “Word of Mouth” I love! Last but not least, believe it or not, I never noticed that opening chord on “Do It Again” sounds like on “A Hard Day’s Night”! 🙂

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    1. Thank you right back for your link earlier on Ellen…and we didn’t know the other was doing it!
      I remember this song in high school…I personally liked it as much as Come Dancing…because I love that riff! Yea the intro is jolting…it fit this song perfect…

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  5. A good one! I’d pretty much forgotten about it but I had the album back in the day and also liked ‘Living on a thin Line’ that you mentioned. Seems like no radio format touches the album now though for some reason. A bit of a shame

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    1. Yea I think it was their last international hit…but yea it’s left alone today for some stupid reason. It’s up there to me in their 80s catalog.

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  6. I hadn’t seen a live version of this song, trust that you would be the one to introduce me to it! This was on the last of a three album run that got me seriously into the Kinks. Actually the last Kinks album I bought period.

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    1. I bought Think Visual after this but yea… you know you have strong albums when some of them didn’t have a top 10 hit but they still sell and chart well.

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  8. the Kinks for me was a later in life thing. Yeah I was growing during you really got me and all day and all of the night…I was more the Low Budget, Misfits and Sleepwalker era which I had al on cassette in my car and driving my friends crazy….and then Davies lost me with Come Dancing……but then odd stuff started popping up, like watching Pirate Radio and Sunny Afternoon and loving that change, and in an interesting movie called Mix Tape a tune called Better Things popped up which was catchy too….

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    1. At the time of Give The People What They Want…I had their greatest hits and knew some about them…but yea I love those 70s albums as well. They had songs that were not giant hits but great songs that got played.

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  13. The thing with the Kinks is there are so many songs that mean a lot to other people, even when I never got the song at the time. This is another one that I enjoyed being re-educated on.

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    1. Yes…this one in paticular has been forgot by a lot of people….but like you said…there is always another one to replace it.

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      1. The two later lesser known/listened to Kinks tracks I lead people towards are ‘Misfits’ and ‘Full Moon.’ But there are not many tracks not worth a listen.

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