Post by phobia on Jun 4, 2008 12:25:10 GMT -5
From the Rolling Stone archives....so good, well worth reading again!
Dave Davies
Bottom Line, New York, June 5, 1998
In the last year, Rock & Roll Hall-of-Famer and Kinks guitarist Dave Davies has played New York's Bottom Line nearly half a dozen times. With little variation in material, he rips through two sets of klassic Kinks and obscure solo cuts to the same fanatical group of die-hard Kinkophiles -- the selfsame group who also return again and again to older brother Ray's own "Storyteller" show. Every one of them would no doubt sacrifice an appendage to see the infamously feuding brothers share the stage again for a legitimate Kinks gig, but brothers will be brothers, Kinks will be Kinks, and their fans have by now learned to accept their fix in half doses: a hit of Ray for sly wit and an enlightening, narrated look through the Kinks' back pages, followed by a bit of Dave the Rave to get your rocks off.
The last time Dave came to town, though -- less than a month ago -- he seemed to skimp a bit on his part of the bargain. Kultists no doubt went home satisfied -- hell, he even dragged the Kinks' original bassist, Peter Quaife, on stage for the encore; but to the slightly less forgiving Kinks fan, the band's lazy performance and Davies' going-through-the-motions guitar work hardly made for a memorable show. Surely this man, who revolutionized rock & roll as we know it with his frantic, distorted and brilliantly sloppy guitar solo on "You Really Got Me" thirty-four years ago had more left in him than *that*. Doesn't he?
Of course he does. Davies came out swinging tonight, leading his young, three-piece band through ecstatic, pummeling versions of "Till the End of the Day" and "I Need You." "She's Got Everything," kicked along with punkish tenacity by drummer Jim Laspesa's (The Muffs) staccato hammering, pushed the intensity level even higher. And Davies kept the excitement alive for nearly every minute of his seventeen-song set. That he did so without ever playing his best-known, self-penned Kinks hit, "Death of a Clown," was testimony that Davies not only still has the proverbial goods but the ornery, "I'm Not Like Everybody Else" attitude worthy of the Kinks' name.
Then again, no self-respecting Kinkophile would come to a Dave Davies show (or even a Kinks show, for that matter) to hear the hits. The more obscure, the better, and Davies never disappoints in that respect. Would there be room in a full-fledged Kinks show to allow Dave to indulge in the likes of "Creeping Jean," a dusty, clumsy and almost metallic in a Blue Oyster Cult sort-of-way stomper, or the achingly lovely "Hold My Hand," an early draft of his own "Strangers," or even a promising new anthem like "Unfinished Business"?
Most likely not. In lieu of "Death of a Clown," however, Ray would surely have to allow his kid brother time for either "Living on a Thin Line" or "Susannah's Still Alive," his moving paean to a childhood sweetheart. Give Dave his own stage, though, and he gives his own material free rein. Ray's compositions aren't forsaken, of course -- even the snootiest Kinks fan needs to hear "You Really Got Me" -- but on a night like tonight, when everything is working, Dave makes them his own. The standing ovation that came after an extended, menacing and utterly convincing "I'm Not Like Everybody Else" was for the singer, not the song.
"This is the part of the show where I read excerpts from my book, Kink," quipped Davies in the quiet after the storm, gently mocking his brother's show (which is heavily based on Ray's "unauthorized autobiography," X-Ray). The joke always goes down well, although the Kinkophiles in the front rows have heard it verbatim at every one of Dave's shows. Out came the acoustic guitar, and with it a fine quartet of subtle gems: two of Ray's finest ("Picture Book" and "Young and Innocent Days") and two of Dave's (1970's "Strangers" and "Love Gets You" from his 1982 solo album, Chosen People) which were just as fine.
He capped the unplugged segment with what is usually (barring tonight's "I'm Not Like Everybody Else") the standout of his show: a new, unrecorded mini-epic called "Fortis Green." For years Dave enthusiasts have pointed to Dave songs ("Death of a Clown," "Strangers") which were "nearly on par with Ray's." "Fortis Green" d**n near beats them all. An incestuous marriage of the Beatles' "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane" crashed by the Kinks' "Autumn Almanac," this whimsical nostalgia trip through Dave's childhood could have been a standout track on 1968's Village Green Preservation Society -- which is to say, it could have been a classic. Here's hoping Davies just gets around to recording it someday soon -- with or without Ray.
RICHARD SKANSE
Dave Davies
Bottom Line, New York, June 5, 1998
In the last year, Rock & Roll Hall-of-Famer and Kinks guitarist Dave Davies has played New York's Bottom Line nearly half a dozen times. With little variation in material, he rips through two sets of klassic Kinks and obscure solo cuts to the same fanatical group of die-hard Kinkophiles -- the selfsame group who also return again and again to older brother Ray's own "Storyteller" show. Every one of them would no doubt sacrifice an appendage to see the infamously feuding brothers share the stage again for a legitimate Kinks gig, but brothers will be brothers, Kinks will be Kinks, and their fans have by now learned to accept their fix in half doses: a hit of Ray for sly wit and an enlightening, narrated look through the Kinks' back pages, followed by a bit of Dave the Rave to get your rocks off.
The last time Dave came to town, though -- less than a month ago -- he seemed to skimp a bit on his part of the bargain. Kultists no doubt went home satisfied -- hell, he even dragged the Kinks' original bassist, Peter Quaife, on stage for the encore; but to the slightly less forgiving Kinks fan, the band's lazy performance and Davies' going-through-the-motions guitar work hardly made for a memorable show. Surely this man, who revolutionized rock & roll as we know it with his frantic, distorted and brilliantly sloppy guitar solo on "You Really Got Me" thirty-four years ago had more left in him than *that*. Doesn't he?
Of course he does. Davies came out swinging tonight, leading his young, three-piece band through ecstatic, pummeling versions of "Till the End of the Day" and "I Need You." "She's Got Everything," kicked along with punkish tenacity by drummer Jim Laspesa's (The Muffs) staccato hammering, pushed the intensity level even higher. And Davies kept the excitement alive for nearly every minute of his seventeen-song set. That he did so without ever playing his best-known, self-penned Kinks hit, "Death of a Clown," was testimony that Davies not only still has the proverbial goods but the ornery, "I'm Not Like Everybody Else" attitude worthy of the Kinks' name.
Then again, no self-respecting Kinkophile would come to a Dave Davies show (or even a Kinks show, for that matter) to hear the hits. The more obscure, the better, and Davies never disappoints in that respect. Would there be room in a full-fledged Kinks show to allow Dave to indulge in the likes of "Creeping Jean," a dusty, clumsy and almost metallic in a Blue Oyster Cult sort-of-way stomper, or the achingly lovely "Hold My Hand," an early draft of his own "Strangers," or even a promising new anthem like "Unfinished Business"?
Most likely not. In lieu of "Death of a Clown," however, Ray would surely have to allow his kid brother time for either "Living on a Thin Line" or "Susannah's Still Alive," his moving paean to a childhood sweetheart. Give Dave his own stage, though, and he gives his own material free rein. Ray's compositions aren't forsaken, of course -- even the snootiest Kinks fan needs to hear "You Really Got Me" -- but on a night like tonight, when everything is working, Dave makes them his own. The standing ovation that came after an extended, menacing and utterly convincing "I'm Not Like Everybody Else" was for the singer, not the song.
"This is the part of the show where I read excerpts from my book, Kink," quipped Davies in the quiet after the storm, gently mocking his brother's show (which is heavily based on Ray's "unauthorized autobiography," X-Ray). The joke always goes down well, although the Kinkophiles in the front rows have heard it verbatim at every one of Dave's shows. Out came the acoustic guitar, and with it a fine quartet of subtle gems: two of Ray's finest ("Picture Book" and "Young and Innocent Days") and two of Dave's (1970's "Strangers" and "Love Gets You" from his 1982 solo album, Chosen People) which were just as fine.
He capped the unplugged segment with what is usually (barring tonight's "I'm Not Like Everybody Else") the standout of his show: a new, unrecorded mini-epic called "Fortis Green." For years Dave enthusiasts have pointed to Dave songs ("Death of a Clown," "Strangers") which were "nearly on par with Ray's." "Fortis Green" d**n near beats them all. An incestuous marriage of the Beatles' "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane" crashed by the Kinks' "Autumn Almanac," this whimsical nostalgia trip through Dave's childhood could have been a standout track on 1968's Village Green Preservation Society -- which is to say, it could have been a classic. Here's hoping Davies just gets around to recording it someday soon -- with or without Ray.
RICHARD SKANSE
