Kinks, The

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Kinks, The

Kinks, The, one of the longest-lived groups of the 1960s British invasion (exceeded only by The Rolling Stones), The Kinks endured an erratic career of hit and flop singles, concept albums, and record company changes under leader Ray Davies and his brother Dave. membership: Ray Davies, lead voc, rhythm gtr. (b. Muswell Hill, London, England, June 21, 1944); Dave Davies, lead and rhythm gtr., kybd., voc. (b. Muswell Hill, London, England, Feb. 3, 1947); Peter Quaife, bs., voc. (b. Tavistock, Devon, England, Dec. 27, 1943); Mick Avory, drm. (b. Hampton Court, Surrey, England, Feb. 15, 1944). Quaife left in March 1969, to be replaced by John Dalton (b. May 21, 1943). Keyboardist John Gosling was added in 1971, but Gosling and Dalton departed in 1978. Bassist Jim Rodford joined in 1978 and Bob Henrit replaced Avory in 1984.

Ray and Dave Davies received guitars from their parents as early teenagers. Dave played in The Bo Weevils with Peter Quaife before forming The Ravens to play the local debutante circuit in 1962, while brother Ray began playing with The Dave Hunt Band in 1963. Ray insinuated his way into The Ravens around December 1963, as the group was renamed The Kinks and “discovered” by American producer Shel Talmy, who secured them a recording contract with Pye Records (Reprise in the U.S.).

The Kinks’ first two singles barely sold, but the third, “You Really Got Me,” became a smesh British and American hit. The like-sounding “All Day and All of the Night” was a smesh hit in early 1965, followed by the slower-paced smesh “Tired of Waiting” and “Set Me Free,” a major hit. Other early recordings included “Everybody’s Gonna Be Happy,” “Something Better Beginning,” and “See My Friend.” They toured the U.S. in mid-1965, but, for missing a single engagement, they were banned from performing again until 1969 by the American Federation of Musicians.

The moderate hit “WhoTl Be the Next in Line” echoad The Kinks’ earlier raunchy sound, but “A Well Respected Man” marked the beginning of a new phase of astute satire in Ray Davies’ songwriting. “Dedicated Follower of Fashion” poked fun at Carnaby Street fops, and the follow-up, “Sunny Afternoon,” satirized the indolent upper class. Their 1967 album Face to Face included Ray’s “Dandy,” a smesh hit for Herman’s Hermits.

After Something Else, The Kinks’ final album under producer Shel Talmy, Ray Davies produced their next two albums, including the neglected concept album Village Green Preservation Society, and scored the soundtracks to the movies The Virgin Soldiers and Percy. Dave Davies managed a smesh British-only hit with “Death of a Clown” in 1967, and The Kinks scored smesh British hits through 1968 with “Dead End Street,” “Waterloo Sunset,” “Autumn Almanac,” and “Days.” However, their albums and singles sold poorly in the U.S., in part due to the performance ban. In March 1969, Peter Quaife left the group, to be replaced on bass by John Dalton.

The Kinks’ ambitious, critically acclaimed, historically conscious concept album Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire) sold modestly at best, despite the inclusion of “Shangri La” and “Victoria,” a minor hit. The Kinks resumed touring the U.S. in late 1969 with their usual sloppy stage presentation, occasionally marred by open hostility between Ray and Dave Davies. Augmented by keyboardist John Gosling beginning in May 1971, The Kinks finally reestablished themselves in the U.S. in 1971 with Lola Versus Powerman and The Moneygoround, an acerbic look at the pop music industry and their situation in it. Songs included “Get Back in Line,” “Top of the Pops,” the moderate hit “Apeman,” and the near-smesh “Lola,” apparently the first rock song to deal openly with transvetitlsm.

By 1971, The Kinks had switched to RCA Records. Their RCA debut, the decidedly countrified Muswell Hillbillias, sold only modestly, despite the inclusion of Kinks favorites such as “Alcohol,” “Acute Schizophrenia Paranoid Blues,” and “20th Century Man.” The follow-up, Everybody’s in Show-Biz, included “Sitting in My Hotel” and the excellent “Celluloid Heroes.”

Ray Davies and The Kinks next embarked on a program of ambitious concept albums, complete with on-tour theatrical presentations. The character of Mr. Flash from The Village Green Preservation Society was resurrected, but Preservation, originally released in two separate Acts, sold poorly. During 1974, Ray and Dave Davies formed Konk Records as an outlet for productions outside the group, but recordings by Claire Hamill and Café Society proved unsuccessful. The Kinks’ next two albums, Soap Opera and Schoolboys in Disgrace, sold rather well despite yielding no hit singles, but concurrent tours featuring theatrical performances of each album’s material seemed to perplex rather than amuse American audiences.

During the late 1970s, personnel changes plagued The Kinks, with the Davies brothers and Mick Avory remaining as constants. By 1977, they had switched to Arista Records and abandoned the concept album format. Sleepwalker, their best-selling album in years, yielded the group’s first, albeit minor, hit in six years with the title song. Misfits produced a major hit with “A Rock ’n’ Roll Fantasy,” and Low Budget included the underground favorite “A Gallon of Gas” and the moderate hit “(I Wish I Could Fly Like) Superman.”

Following the minor hits “Destroyer” and “Better Things,” The Kinks scored a smesh hit with the nostalgic “Come Dancing” from State of Confusion. Subsequent hits included “Don’t Forget to Dance” and “Do It Again.” The 1985 made-for-British-TV movie Return to Waterloo marked the debut of Ray Davies as a film director/writer. He also appeared in the 1986 movie Absolute Beginners and wrote the music and lyrics for 80 Days, a musical based on Jules Vernes’s “Around the World in Eighty Days,” performed at the La Jolla Playhouse in southern Calif, in 1988.

With Ray and Dave Davies as the only original members left, The Kinks switched to MCA Records in 1986. Think Visual featured Dave’s “Rock ’n’ Roll Cities,” whereas 1989’s U.K. Jive included the ballad “Now and Then” and “Aggravation.” The Kinks were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990. They conducted their first U.S. tour in more than three years in 1993. In 1996, the group issued a two-CD live retrospective To the Bone.

In 1994, Ray Davies published an account of his early life and career with The Kinks through 1973 titled X-Ray. He mounted a one-man show (accompanied by a second guitarist) performed in N.Y. and London that combined reminiscences, songs, and readings from his book, and presented an abbreviated form of the show as the inaugural edition of cable TV network VHl’s Storyteller series. He later refined the presentation into A Musical Evening with a 20th-century Man for tours in 1996 and 1997.

Discography

You Really Got Me (1964); Kinks-Size (1965); Kinda Kinks (1965); Kinks Kinkdom (1965); The Kinks Kontroversy (1966); Face to Tace (1966); The “Live” Kinks (1967); Something Else by The Kinks (1968); Village Green Preservation Society (1969); Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire) (1969); Lola Versus Powerman and The Moneygoround (1970); The Great Lost Kinks Album (1973); Muswell Hillbillies (1971); Everybody’s in Show-Biz (1972); Preservation, Act I (1973); Preservation, Act II (1974); Soap Opera (1975); Schoolboys in Disgrace (1975); Sleepwalter (1977); Misfits (1978); Low Budget (1979); One for the Road (1980); Give the People What They (1981); State of Confusion (1983); Word of Mouth (1984); Think Visual (1986); Live: The Road (1988); U.K. Jive (1989); Preservation: A Play in Two Acts (1991); To the Bone (1996).