Friday, April 18, 2014

KLEM FM

Fifty years ago today, The Kinks recorded their second flop in row, "You Still Want Me," a song written by Ray Davies:


The song sounds indistinguishable from many of The Beatles wannabes at that time. Faced with losing their recording contract if they didn't produce a hit sooner rather than later, the band persevered. Guitarist Dave Davies (younger brother of Ray) never lost hope:
We were too energized to worry about that. We knew that we were going to make it. 
Davies went on to invent another guitar sound that changed rock when the band recorded "You Really Got Me" in two takes later that summer.


Wild and crazy guitar solo by Dave Davies at 1 min 12 secs.

7 comments:

chickelit said...

Notice how drummer Mick Avory plays using a style you don't see much anymore: the so-called "traditional grip" -- left hand underhand, right hand overhand. That is really old school and came from the jazz tradition and before that marching bands where it was more comfortable to play that way with the drum slung to one side.

Drum & Bugle Corps and other marching bands still play that way.

bagoh20 said...

I know it's real, but it looks like they were wearing wigs - outrageous, over the top, unconvincing wigs.

bagoh20 said...

And that first song really does suck, but that second one - the cover of the Van Halen Classic - is much better.

Chip Ahoy said...

The second one really gets me.

I have to go to sleep. My head is being squeezed like a vice and my eyes stabbed, and it hurts like h-e-double icepicks.

when I wake up it will be gone zzzzzzzzz

deborah said...

Sorry you were feeling so miserable last night, Chip.

Yeah. The first song isn't that bad. Seems like it would have been in the top 50 or something.

lol bago, I thought chick wrote that, so when I watched I thought, wow they do look like wigs. It must be genetics.

ndspinelli said...

The Kinks were always one of my favs. They never got the level of fame they deserved.

chickelit said...

They never got the level of fame they deserved.

Part of that was bad publicity and banishment in their prime. From the Wiki:

Following a mid-[1965] tour of the United States, the American Federation of Musicians refused permits for the group to appear in concerts there for the next four years, effectively cutting off The Kinks from the main market for rock music at the height of the British Invasion.[1][32] Although neither The Kinks nor the union gave a specific reason for the ban, at the time it was widely attributed to their rowdy on-stage behaviour.[32] link

The footnote cites at the Wiki link don't really shed light on what led to such a drastic decision. Certainly, millions of dollars were at stake. I'm surprised nobody ever litigated this.