The Stranglers' "All Day and All of the Night"
UK new wavers made their mark with the big guitar chords and strident choruses of "Hanging Around", then paid tribute to the obvious influence -- early Kinks -- in their tenth studio album.

The Fall's "Victoria"
George doesn't like this one, and to be fair, it doesn't sound very Fall-like. Still, you can have fun picturing Mark E. Smith in mirror shades and big bell-bottoms as he and the band turn in a very true-to-mod cover. 50,000 Fans Can't Be Wrong. Can they?

Elvis Costello's "Days"
A consummate borrower, Costello poached a Kinks guitar riff from "The Hard Way" for his song "London's Brilliant Parade" on Brutal Youth. He does even better when he borrows the whole song, as on this lovely rendition. Find it on the excellent, though '80s-centric, Until the End of the World soundtrack.

Pretenders' "Stop Sobbing"
One of the best Kinks covers ever, this 1978 track layers Chrissie Hynde's distinctive punk voice over and around itself in a frantic "stop sobbing" chorus. Two years after recording it for her debut record (produced by Nick Lowe with a bit of help from Elvis Costello), Hynde met Ray Davies in a club. The two had an affair that lasted three years and produced a daughter.

Elliott Smith's "Waterloo Sunset"
From 1967's Something Else, this track marked the Kinks' departure from harder, guitar-driven rock songs to more gentle, lyrical material. Davies says he woke up one morning singing this airy, dreamy, completely sublime tune. It is one of pop music's happiest sad songs -- or saddest happy ones -- and a near perfect match for Elliott Smith's lovely, nuance-shaded voice. The cover was never released, but live versions are easy to find in MP3 format (and well worth seeking out).

The Raincoats' "Lola"
If we were going to be dogmatic about things, we might say that no one should cover "Lola". It is, after all, one of the Kinks' best-known songs, a track so infectious and ear-wormy that it reached a top-ten chart position in uptight 1970s America despite the fact that it was about a transvestite. Still, if you're going to cover it, why not add a layer of, well, Kinky-ness. The Raincoats' deadpan female vocals turn the gender-bending lyrics up a notch, making the "he was a she" surprise just a tiny bit more twisted.

The Jam's "David Watts"
Another excellent tune from Something Else, this one slyly poking fun at a rich and popular Mr. Perfect. The Jam take Davies' bemusement and turn it into acid contempt in a punk stomping cover that became much better known than the original.

Television Personalities' "I'm Not Like Everybody Else"
The B-side to 1966's "Sunny Afternoon" (see below), this song was one of the few early Kinks cuts sung by Dave Davies. Rebellious lyrics -- "And I don't want to ball about like everybody else / And I don't want to live my life like everybody else! / And I won't say that I feel fine like everybody else! / 'Cause I'm not like everybody else" -- fit Television Personalities' troubled Dan Treacy as well as the younger Davies, and this cover is as psyche-heavy and dangerous sounding as a track can be.

Van Halen's "Where Have All the Good Times Gone"
Making a giant leap from the sublime to the ridiculous, hair metal legends (and my 15-year-old self's very favorite band) Van Halen take all the bittersweet ambiguity out of this song and turns it into showtime. The complex, cardigan-wearing individual caught mourning his youth on the Kinks' version has turned into a Corvette driving teenager violating the open-container law. Higher brow, pointy-headed intellectual types may prefer the Bowie cover, but my feeling is that if you can get Elliott Smith and Van Halen to cover your songs, you've pretty much settled the "wide appeal" question.

Tom Jones's "Sunny Afternoon"
Another odd choice, with one of the world's premier lounge lizards putting the operatic drama into what was, up to then, a lovely little song. Still, the song's about the tax problems of over-the-top rock stars, and who's more over the top than Tom Jones?

Fish's "Apeman"
A reasonably good cover of Ray Davies' whimsical political manifesto. Former Marillion vocalist Derek William Dick probably scored with hippie chicks half his age thanks to lyrics like these: "I think I'm so educated and I'm so civilized / 'cos strict vegetarian / And with the over population / And inflation and starvation crazy politicians. / I don't feel safe in this world / No more don't want to die in a nuclear war."

Beat Farmers' "20th Century Man"
Country Dick Montana was a past president of a Kinks Preservation Society fan club when he formed this legendary but ill-fated country rock band. The Kinks cover appears on 1990's Live, Loud and Plowed, a raucous live album that counts among the band's best. Unbelievably, the album was released without the band's knowledge during a protracted and nasty fight with the label. Montana reportedly found out about it when he saw it in a Tower Records bin. The story gets even sadder from here, as Montana died at the age of 40 in 1995.

Yo La Tengo's "Fancy"
If we're giving out prizes (or penalties) for frequent Kinks coverage, Hoboken's finest will go to the head of the line. The cover list at the official Kinks site has them down for more than a dozen renditions, including Ride the Tiger's "Big Sky", live versions of "God's Children", "King Kong" and "Sweet Lady Genevieve", "Oklahoma U.S.A." (on the all-cover Fakebook), and this slow and beautiful version of "Fancy".