The Kinks What do Van Halen, the Raincoats, Mott the Hoople, the Pretenders, Elvis Costello, Big Star, the Fall, Herman's Hermits, the Jam, Kristy Macoll, David Bowie and Blur have in common?

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What do Van Halen, the Raincoats, Mott the Hoople, the Pretenders, Elvis Costello, Big Star, the Fall, Herman's Hermits, the Jam, Kristy Macoll, David Bowie and Blur have in common? Not a whole hell of a lot except that they've all done songs penned by Raymond Douglas Davies of course. The Kinks songbook of the '60s is varied and strong enough to get such a wide range of groups as fans. The band rode in on the British invasion with loud, unruly rockers but soon turned into a quirky, nostalgic outfit that made their best work totally out-of-synch with the rest of the music world: only Donovan was as out-of-it musically but Davies had a better ear for melodies and more thoughtful lyrics.

When the band started out with a string of hits including "You Really Got Me" and "All Day and All the Night," it looked like they were on top of the world and ready to stay there. Problems racked the band though including, for Ray, nervous breakdowns, blackouts, and drunken fits. As Ray put it, there was "jealousy, greed, resentment, misunderstanding" not to mention his storing money in footware. It was the pressure of touring, mistrust of managers and record companies and worst of all, an incident with the powerful American Federation of Musicians union. Whether Ray did or didn't slug someone isn't important- the result is that the band was banded from gigging in the USA for four years. For a band that was just peaking, this was a disaster. Also considering that most bands don't last for four years, it was amazing that the band survived. As it was, they had to watch a flood of other English bands invade the States and rake in the money.

Back home in England, their singles scored pretty well though their albums were (financial) flops. It was during this time, about 1966-1971, that was the band's prime time where they made great, very unfashionable music. Like the Beach Boys, the Beatles and Rolling Stones, the band starting making albums as complete statements rather than just a bunch of singles with filler. But while the rest of the USA/UK bands were indulging in psychedelic sounds, Davies in company were indulging in whimsy, music hall and nostalgia: you could almost imagine him in a straw hat and stripped shirt with a cane, a smile and a wink prancing around a stage. It was too British for the American market and not "groovy" enough for Swinging London. The result was that the Kinks albums from this time (up to LOLA) were thought to have only chalked up a sales of a couple of thousand only after tearing up the charts a few years before that.

Not too surprising then, the group was in constant upheaval. Other than Ray chasing a manager around the streets, only to wind up in a looney bin. Bassist Peter Quaife quit and rejoined the band only to quit again in 1969. Drummer Mick Avory took time off for medical reasons and Ray's brother Dave auditioned replacements for Ray himself in the band. The few gigs they did manage were sloppy and full of fist-fights among the group. What's worse, the band was getting little support from their record company and their producer Shel Talmy was getting pushed out by Ray so that he could take over the production chores. With his professional and personal life turning into shit, his lyrics started to reflect this burden, getting depressed at first and looking for escapes later and the music itself maybe also leaning to "good-old-days."

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"Dedicated Follower of Fashion" and "Well Respected Man" showed that Davies was knew how to rap the middle-class over the knuckles. Although the band was starting to show some sophistication with THE KINKS CONTROVERSY (with "I'm On An Island" and a Sleepy John Estes cover), their prime stuff really began with FACE TO FACE. Mixing their rowdy rock with Indian scales, folk, music hall, they did it all tastefully with only Nicky Hopkins' harpsichord playing along with them. Ray's songs ran the gamut from the commercialization of culture, a plea to a lost love, working as a sideman ...

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