Stories of the weird and wonderful people and places in London's history!
First thing’s first: if you’ve never heard Waterloo Sunset by the Kinks, then listen to it here. I was shocked, nay appalled, to discover that both my housemate and my girlfriend had never come across it.
The quintessential London anthem, Waterloo Sunset was released in 1967 and reached number two in the UK charts. Inexplicably it failed to chart in the US, despite being placed at 42 on Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. The lyrics conjure up images of standing on the bridge on a summer evening, watching the world drift by as the bright orange sun shimmers on the dirty old river and lowers behind Westminster. But shockingly the song was originally written about an entirely different city.
In a 2010 interview with the Liverpool Echo, Kinks frontman Ray Davies revealed that Waterloo Sunset was originally titled…Liverpool Sunset. That “dirty old river” was intended to be the Mersey, rather than the Thames. Davies told the reporter:
“Liverpool is my favourite city, and the song was originally called 'Liverpool Sunset'. I was inspired by Merseybeat. I'd fallen in love with Liverpool by that point. On every tour, that was the best reception… Later it got changed to 'Waterloo Sunset', but there's still that play on words with Waterloo [Waterloo is an area of Sefton]. London was home, I'd grown up there, but I like to think I could be an adopted Scouser. My heart is definitely there.”
(The complete opposite of yours truly: I was born in Old Swan but consider myself a Londoner before a Scouser. I’ll always be a Lancastrian first and foremost though).
So why the change of name, if not the change of heart? Davies decided it was best to write about what he knew: as a child being cared for at St Thomas’ Hospital the nurses had wheeled him onto the balcony to overlook the river; he’d been taken to the 1951 Festival of Britain on the Southbank by his father; and he’d walked hand in hand across Waterloo Bridge with his first wife Rasa Didzpetris. Waterloo was an area that played a dominant role in Davies's memories of youth.
But as to the question on everyone’s lips after hearing Waterloo Sunset: who exactly are Terry and Julie who meet at Waterloo Station every Friday night? At the time of the song’s release it was rumoured to be famous British actors Terence Stamp and Julie Christie, who had appeared together in Far From the Madding Crowd. But in 2008, Davies clarified that it was “a fantasy about my sister going off with her boyfriend to a new world and they were going to emigrate and to go another country”. It was about the dreams of the post-war generation, who had infinitely more opportunities than their parents had.
So now, the next time you’re not feeling too lazy to wander, you can let the true meaning of those beautifully haunting lyrics sink in as you gaze upon the paradise of a Waterloo Sunset.
For more stories about the bizarre and quirky history of the capital, check out my other articles, or click here to subscribe to future updates!
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