Return to Waterloo

Infobox Album
Name = Return To Waterloo
Type = studio
Artist = Ray Davies


Released = 1985
Recorded =
Genre = Rock
Length =
Label =
Producer = Ray Davies
Reviews =
Last album =
This album = Return to Waterloo
Next album = The Storyteller

"Return to Waterloo" is an album and hour-long film by Kinks' leader and chief songwriter Ray Davies. Several of the tracks on the album release were also available in near-identical form on The Kinks 1984 release Word of Mouth.

From the DVD release sleeve-notes.

Ray Davies of The Kinks, well-respected as one of rock's best storytellers, makes his film-making debut as director, writer and composer of RETURN TO WATERLOO. This hour-long feature is a unique approach to the synthesis of music, video and cinema. Instead of dialogue, the story is told through music and lyrics. The haunting songs, unavailable on any Kinks album, take renowned actor Ken Colley on a suspenseful journey through his imagination, as he confronts reality and fantasy, love and violence. Also starring: Valerie Holliman, Dominique Barnes, Tim Roth and (briefly) Ray Davies himself.

This film, a cult-classic, is a watershed event in the development of the music video art form, as it was created for itself rather than to promote a record, concert, or grouping of promo videos.

While the special effects are dated and in today's day and age almost humorous, you are seamlessly brought into the mind of the traveler as he muses over his past and what could have been, (and what he may be) as he travels on his daily journey. "Missing Person" is a particularly haunting melody that brings you into both the despair of himself and his relationship with his wife.

RETURN TO WATERLOO embraces Ray Davies' satirical (and occasionally comical) view of modern society, as reflected in over thirty albums over a remarkable twenty-five years with The Kinks.

#* Written and directed by Ray Davies
#* Music written by Ray Davies and performed by Ray Davies, Mick Avory, Jim Rodford, Ian Gibbons of The Kinks
#* With Ken Colley as 'The Traveller'
#* Produced by Dennis Woolf