Lyrics to
Rats

This version of Rats was released by The Kinks in 1970.

Our The Kinks Songs profile has Rats lyrics from 1970 and most if not all of the lyrics by The Kinks that we have here at Decade Lyrics.

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

I was lost just wandering round downtown
Many people pushing me around
Hate spreads just like infection
Those rats jumping on and off my back
Fat black rats holding me down
I see rats in every direction
No time to catch your breath
Crazy people lost their heads
Masses trampling on my feet, inconsiderate in their heat
Those rats breeding angriness and spite
Never have done anything right for people like you and me
Walk over all the people you can’t see
If they die there’s more bread for me
Like snakes crawling through the grass
No time to catch your breath
Crazy people lost their heads
Masses trampling on my feet, inconsiderate in their heat
Those rats breeding angriness and spite
Never have done anything right for people like you and me
See that face man look at me, he’s much too selfish to see
Once he was warm and was kind
Now all he has got is a pinstripe mind
See that face man look at me, he’s much too selfish to see
Once he was warm and was kind
Now all he has got is a pinstripe mind

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The Kinks has released many songs over the years besides Rats. 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 lyrics from 1970s songs looking for more songs from 1970 or the 1970s overall, you've come to the right place!

About Lyrics and Rats by The Kinks

The lyrics to Rats are the words, verses and chorus for the song released by The Kinks in 1970. Elements of the lyrics to Rats are both direct in meaning and also metaphorical with the real meanings of the song only known by The Kinks and any collaborating writers working on the lyrics for Rats back when it was created.

Some people have an interest in the etymology behind words and phrases. You can take apart the lyrics to Rats by The Kinks in a number of ways. 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 Rats" means the words set to the music of Rats, 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 Rats and the lyrics to Rats 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 Rats, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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