Happy 81st birthday to Sir Raymond Douglas Davies, CBE . Born today 21st June 1944.

"Those three chords were part of my life - G, F, Bb"

@TheKinks #photooftheday #RayDavies #photography #music

Terry O'Neil

The Kinks – Something Else by the Kinks (1967, UK)

As randomly chosen by survey[1] on Mastodon, our next spotlight is on number 842 on The List, submitted by leodurruti.

If you’re following our #BowieADay schedule, the Bowie album on the docket today is Reality (2003). And TIL the Japanese and tour versions of Reality included a cover of “Waterloo Sunset”, which, also TIL, is the last track on the album we’re looking at here, Something Else by the Kinks. And, again TIL, that studio extra was recorded just a couple weeks prior to a live duet of the song by Bowie and his long-time friend Ray Davies, i.e., frontman of the Kinks, at the Tibet House Benefit in February 2003. To summarize, though “Waterloo Sunset” has been kicking around in my head for decades thanks to Elliott Smith’s fantastic cover, and though I’ve obsessively been listening to Bowie for nearly a decade, today is the first time I’ve listened to Bowie’s cover(s) or to the Kinks’ original. Indeed, today is the first time I’ve listened to an entire Kinks record.

How this happened, I don’t know. I’m familiar with the other big Kinks hits “Lola” and “You Really Got Me”, and I’ve had their next album, The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society (1968), on my unwritten list of albums to get to eventually for quite some time. And I knew Elliott Smith’s cover was a cover, one I’ve always loved at that, I just never really bothered to look up who it was a cover of. So when Something Else came up as the next album on The List to spotlight and I saw “Waterloo Sunset” in the tracklist, I went:

It’s a Kinks song?!
[*searches “Kinks Waterloo Sunset”*]
It’s a Kinks song!
Wait…Bowie covered it?!
Bowie covered it!
Wait, I thought Village Green was the Kinks album to listen to. Is it going to be a slog to get to “Waterloo”?
By golly it’s not a slog, this is great!

And that, friends, is the gift you all have given me and others like me with The List. It’s never too late to fill in those gaps, or to discover moar Bowie.

Also, friends, not sure if this was leodurruti’s intention on submitting Something Else rather than the much-lauded Village Green (which I also listened to for the first time today), but I think this album is possibly better than Village Green? But don’t listen to me, I’m just a newborn baby Kinks fan! And there’s, like, 24 other Kinks studio albums I have to get to now! Anyone up for a deep dive?

• Songlink: The Kinks – Something Else by the Kinks
• Discogs: The Kinks – Something Else by the Kinks

1. The survey choices that initially led to this spotlight were “I’m not a woman, I’m not a man”, “I am something that you’ll never understand”, “I’ll never beat you, I never lie”, and “And if you’re evil I’ll forgive you by and by cuz”. The second option was the winning selection, and so the survey result was translated as picking the second album in The List that contained a word in the phrase – in this case, “something”. ↩︎

I saw #TheKinks #RayDavies 'Storyteller' tour back in 1998 (https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/ray-davies/1998/wycombe-swan-high-wycombe-england-b86094a.html) so really pleased to see this addition to the 'Albums That Should Exist' blog of a recording of his VH-1 Storytellers session from around this time;

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2024/09/ray-davies-vh-1-storytellers-vh-1.html

80 years old today.

Born 21st June 1944 Sir Raymond Douglas Davies CBE,

#raydavies #kinks #music #photography

Andrew Maclear/Mirrorpix

"You Really Got Me" is a song by English rock band #theKinks, written by frontman #RayDavies. The song, originally performed in a more #blues-orientated style, was inspired by artists such as #LeadBelly and #BigBillBroonzy. Two song versions were recorded, with the second performance used for the final single. Although it was rumoured that future #LedZeppelin guitarist #JimmyPage had performed the song's guitar solo.
https://youtu.be/-2GmzyeeXnQ

Since it’s his birthday I’m reposting my photo of Sir Raymond Douglas Davies.

#Photography #35mm #FilmPhotography #Photography #BlackAndWhitePhotography #TheKinks #Music #RayDavies #Photo #Bnw #NoirEtBlanc #Fotografie #ConcertPhotography

Ted Tocks Covers

Celluloid Heroes

Originally posted on June 22, 2020

#RayDavies of the #TheKinks' was honoured with the London Legend Award at a ceremony held at the Camden Roundhouse. Upon accepting Davies said "I accept this on behalf of all the young writers coming through, all the young people embarking on careers and as a symbol of the future.”

"Everybody's a dreamer and everybody's a star
And everybody's in movies, it doesn't matter who you are"

https://tedtockscovers.wordpress.com/2020/06/22/celluloid-heroes-a-tip-of-the-hat-to-the-great-raydavies-showman-songwriter-and-philosopher-musicislife-tedtockscovers-thekinks-joanjett-bonjovi-stevevai/

Let's get The Kinks on the Fediverse !

The Kinks’ Dave Davies says Elon Musk's is suppressing the bands’ content.

We Are the Viral Toot Restoration Society

#TheKinks #DaveDavies #RayDavies #VillageGreenPreservationSociety #MuswellHillbillies #BritishInvasion #MastodonMigration #Music

@nitishpahwa

https://slate.com/technology/2023/03/kinks-twitter-dave-davies-interview-content-moderation-censorship.html