Redux

Thank you to those who seemed concerned about me (and this ever more indulgent blog) after my last post. I guess I lied - I'm back. I have far too much time on my hands at the moment (I'm having a bit of time off work), and we all know how things start to look a bit skewed when that happens. Let us say no more about my last couple of histrionic posts, now redacted. They remind me why I should stick to politics and music and not delve into the mire that is personal relationships on this here blog. I love my friends as they were, and as they are, but I am nostalgic and immature and a little soft in the head, and I expect people to grow and atrophy in the same ways I have, and not in their myriad different ways. Which isn't really fair.

Ray Davies says it best (if a little pithily in that last verse) in Do you remember Walter:

Walter, remember when the world was young
And all the girls knew Walter's name?
Walter, isn't it a shame the way our little world has changed?
Do you remember, Walter, playing cricket in the thunder and the rain?
Do you remember, Walter, smoking cigarettes behind your garden gate?
Yes, Walter was my mate,
But Walter, my old friend, where are you now?
Walter's name.
Walter, isn't it a shame the way our little world has changed?
Do you remember, Walter, how we said we'd fight the world so we'd be free.
We'd save up all our money and we'd buy a boat and sail away to sea.
But it was not to be.
I knew you then but do I know you now?
Walter, you are just an echo of a world I knew so long ago
If you saw me now you wouldn't even know my name.
I bet you're fat and married and you're always home in bed by half-past eight.
And if I talked about the old times you'd get bored and you'll have nothing more to say.
Yes people often change, but memories of people can remain.

Speaking of Ray, as we now are, he is one of my all time musical heroes. My adoration of The Kinks has been more constant than a hell of a lot of other things in my life – taste in clothes, housing circumstances, country of residence and occupation. My relationship with his music has even transcended friendships, and, I have to admit, it’s more tangible than that shared with most of my relatives. I even chose to write about The Village Green Preservation Society as part of my Arts degree, knowing that it was one of the few subjects I could be bothered researching*. Around that time two good friends and I were chatting about our favourite bands. Theirs were the more contemporary Primal Scream and The Smiths respectively (still more contemporary than the Kinks – a band whose best-known work was completed before any of us were born). When I was pressed to give my response I had to settle on The Kinks, because it was the truth, though it felt woefully daggy to admit it. But there it is, The Kinks still shit on not only their peers (The Stones, The Who, and yes, even the Beatles), but also on most of the melodic guitar-based music that has come out of the UK since, and especially on their horrid snivelling little Britpop imitators. Indeed, in recent times that once fertile pop territory has become a wasteland, with all the most innovative music coming out of the States (as a former anglophile I never thought I’d say it) and elsewhere (here, Sweden, Cambodia). But I digress.

One night while living in London in the mid-nineties (unfortunately this was at the height of Blur’s rather irritating appropriation of Ray’s postcard-from-Blackpool Englishness – see ‘snivelling little Britpop imitators’ above), I even took the bus up to Muswell Hill to have a look at the house the Davies brothers grew up in. This sort of obsessive behaviour is rare for me. I love music, but I rarely lurk around stage doors or any of that stuff. It’s not my bag – I don’t need mementos or validation (a la Pamela Des Barres) from those I admire. At least, I haven’t for a long time…I suppose that’s part of growing up. But in the lead up to seeing Ray at the Palais on Friday night I had been having dreams about meeting the benevolent, dimpled, twinkly-eyed genius.

So we arrived at the Palais, quaking with excitement amidst young Dave Davies lookalike coolsies and their Penelope Tree girlfriends and (the majority) paunchy silver-haired collector types. And of course Ray was brilliant – as if you didn’t know I was going to say that. Wiry and energetic, and pulling off the obligatory final-chord-scissor-kick (à la Pete Townshend) at the end of every song, he certainly doesn’t look his 63 years from a distance. His voice was pitch perfect, and the winks, gestures and wry asides suggested he is still very much on the ball. He was, as expected, utterly charming. When he launched solo into the first gentle bars of 'Days', I felt the tears well up.

My only complaint was that the set list was a little disappointing – he asked us to indulge him for a bit while he played his (very good) recent material, which we were more than happy to do, but when the old stuff came it was the safe, chart-topping, boomer-pleasing stuff like ‘All Day and All of the Night’ and, of course ‘Lola’. To be fair, all the hits had to be played, and everyone (including me) was expecting them. He left the stage after the encore without having played 'Waterloo Sunset', but then strolled back on and did it brilliantly, saying ‘Oh, I can’t believe I forgot to play this’. It might have been part of the schtick, but it was pretty convincing, and we were alarmed that he might have forgotten to play the song that 'changed his life'. Of course, we were hoarse from shouting it by the end of the night. But if only he could have thrown in ‘No Return’ from Something Else by the Kinks, ‘Big Sky’ from Village Green (or anything from that album actually), or ‘Shangri La’ from Arthur or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire, it would have been perfect. Ray bears the mark of a true artist (as opposed to simply a multi-million-selling megastar) - one whose genius can be discerned in the space between the hits, in the many memorable, diverse, off-beat album tracks. He sold that remarkable ability short by playing to the cheesy Gold 104 crowd.

Anyway, there was an interval – Ray announced he’d join us again in 15 minutes. During this interval I went and bought a bottle of water from the kiosk and absentmindedly shoved it back in my bag – without its lid. Everything in my bag was soaked and had to be laid out on the dark, dusty Palais floor to dry while Ray did his second set. After the show we were about halfway back to the car when Chris realised I’d left my ipod earphones on the floor near our seats. Big deal, I thought, but we walked back to the venue, carefully retracing our steps. We were let back inside to scout around for them with the help of an usher and a torch, but we couldn’t find them. Chris seemed to care more about it than I did. Anyway, as we left the venue for a second time, we spotted a little crowd waiting by the Palais side exit – its composition 70% pure spock, 30% haircutted coolsie. The coolsies had a ukelele and were (rather cringingly) singing Dedicated Follower of Fashion. We decided to lurk for a while, ending up talking to a Glenn Robbins-looking collector bloke and his tubby, bearded friend who was sporting a Kinks Official Fan Club t-shirt in XXL, replete with soup stains, tucked into his (rather too) low slung jeans – bless. A Japanese fan (who, we eavesdropped, had been at the soundcheck) and a guy with a thick Euro accent who’d seen the Kinks in 1972 (and, it sounded like, every time they’d toured since then) rounded out the group. They were absolutely lovely guys. I don’t get the Nick Hornby stereotype of the record geek who doesn’t know how to include women in conversation. I think he’s a bit of a straw man. In my experience, these guys are so blinded by the music that they’re happy to chat to anyone, no matter what their age or gender or ethnicity, who shares their passion. I’ve always found that sort of guy fascinating – they’re kindred spirits.

Anyway, we thought about splitting a couple of times, but just as we were about to, Ray emerged. I reached through the pack and took his hand and said something inane (“Ray, take care” or something silly) and he clasped my hand and said “Thanks sweetheart.” Ray Davies called me sweetheart. Ridiculously, that means more to me than so many other things, and will probably keep me warm through lots of life’s other disappointments.

Chris got an autograph (oh, the cheesiness of it all - but I don't care) and we set off for the car again. Chris was just saying what a strange night it had been when he looked down and found my earphones lying on a St Kilda footpath. Bizarre! I couldn’t have given a stuff about them – but if we hadn’t doubled back for them, I would never have squeezed Ray’s hand. And as Chris said, if we hadn’t gone back to the venue and met Ray, we would probably never have found the earphones either. So in the end, all unfolded as it should.

Thank you for the days,
Those endless days, those sacred days you gave me.
I'm thinking of the days,
I won't forget a single day, believe me.

I bless the light,
I bless the light that lights on you believe me.
And though you're gone,
You're with me every single day, believe me.

Days I'll remember all my life,
Days when you can't see wrong from right.
You took my life,
But then I knew that very soon you'd leave me,
But it's all right,
Now I'm not frightened of this world, believe me.

I wish today could be tomorrow,
The night is dark,
It just brings sorrow anyway.

Thank you for the days,
Those endless days, those sacred days you gave me.
I'm thinking of the days,
I won't forget a single day, believe me.

Days I'll remember all my life,
Days when you can't see wrong from right.
You took my life,
But then I knew that very soon you'd leave me,
But it's all right,
Now I'm not frightened of this world, believe me.
Days.

Thank you for the days,
Those endless days, those sacred days you gave me.
I'm thinking of the days,
I won't forget a single day, believe me.

I bless the light,
I bless the light that shines on you believe me.
And though you're gone,
You're with me every single day, believe me.
Days.

*I'm considering posting my essay here, with all its gauche 19 year old wordiness. But I will spare you. You've had enough of mental behaviour caused by too much thinking and too many late nights.

**Is anyone else in love with Ned Collette, or is it only me?