Lyrics to
National Health

This version of National Health was released by The Kinks in 1979.

Our About The Kinks page at Decade Lyrics includes the lyrics for National Health from 1979 as well as all of the other lyrics from The Kinks that we have in our lyrics database.

Here's more interesting things in songs and lyrics tied to The Kinks or about the 1970s in general.

Nervous tension, man’s invention,
Is the biggest killer that’s around today
Let the tension out or it will build and build inside
And strike you down some day
Nervous tension, man’s invention
Is the biggest waste of human energy
Let the tension out, or it will surely kill
And that will be a tragedy

Valium helps you for a while
But somehow valium seems to bring me down
There’s no pill I can recommend where side effects
Aren’t guaranteed to send you round the bend

You gotta let out the tension
With a little bit of exercise
Loosen up your muscles
And feel the knots in your body untie

We oh we oh
Oh oh oh oh ah ah ah ah
Oh oh oh oh ah ah ah ah

It sure beats quaaludes
It sure beats cocaine
Even Freud recommends it
Cos it relieves the strain

Altogether now
Oh oh oh oh ah ah ah ah
Oh oh oh oh ah ah ah ah

Some people say it sends you deaf
Some people say it sends you blind
Some people say it makes you old
Some people say it blows your mind

But I say

If it’s good for your health
It’s good for your mind
If it keeps you together
It’s really all right
We oh we oh

Oh c’mon, kick the cat

Oh oh oh oh it’s the state of the national health
Oh oh oh oh Blame it on the national health

Nervous tension, nervous tension, nervous tension
Nervous tension. nervous tension, nervous tension
Nervous tension, man’s invention
Is the biggest killer that’s around

Oh oh oh oh ah ah ah ah
Oh oh oh oh ah ah ah an

Valium helps you for a while
But somehow valium seems to bring me down
There’s no pill I can recommend where side effects
Aren’t guaranteed to drive you round the bend

I say I say

Oh oh oh oh it’s good for your health
Keeps you together, it’s the state of the national health
Oh oh oh oh Blame it on the national health
Oh oh oh oh it’s the state of the national health
Oh oh oh oh ah ah ah ah

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The Kinks has released many songs over the years besides National Health. The Kinks released songs from 1964 to 1993 spanning across albums like Kinks, Kinda Kinks, The Kink Kontroversy, Face To Face, Something Else, The Village Green Preservation Society, Arthur (Or The Decline And Fall Of The British Empire), Lola Versus Powerman And The Moneygoround, Part One, Muswell Hillbillies, Percy, Everybody's In Show-Biz, Preservation Act I, Preservation Act II, Soap Opera, Schoolboys In Disgrace, Sleepwalker, Misfits, Low Budget, Give The People What They Want, State Of Confusion, Word Of Mouth, Think Visual, UK Jive, and Phobia. Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by The Kinks.

If you're a fan of popular 1970s songs looking for more songs from 1979 or the 1970s overall, you've come to the right place!

About Lyrics and National Health by The Kinks

The lyrics to National Health are just the words, phrases, verses and chorus that The Kinks used when the song was created in 1979. The lyrics to National Health have both easy-to-spot meanings and hidden metaphors that have been discussed by the music press and fans, but only The Kinks and any collaborators know all of the inspirations for the song.

If you like etymology or breaking apart phrases and words, it is easy to understand the lyrics to National Health by The Kinks. The word "lyric" itself derives from the Latin word lyricus, with the actual English word lyrics applied to the definition "words set to music" listed in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms. Continuing the chain, the Latin word lyricus derives from the Greek word λυρικός or lyrikós. This somewhat means "poetry accompanied by the lyre" or "words set to music." You can easily see that by looking at the background of the word lyric, that the "lyrics to National Health" means the words set to the music of National Health, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by The Kinks. The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words to a song. However, the singular form lyric is also commonly used to refer to a specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics. Hence, by this analysis of word structure, you could say that the lyric to National Health and the lyrics to National Health are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of The Kinks who came here looking just for the lyrics to National Health, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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