Definitely colourised! This is from Shindig, 1965 (think it may have been taped in London as far back as 1964 though). AFAIK there's no colour performance footage of The Kinks before the 1969 Once More with Felix clip (there's plenty of silent colour home movie footage from before that though).
A few years ago when I was checking out all the Kinks albums on Spotify and buying the ones I liked, the first album is the only one from the 1960s I didn't buy. I've scarcely listened to any of it except "You Really Got Me" and "Stop Your Sobbing" since. Interesting to hear it again, it's not as boring as I remembered. "Beautiful Delilah" is very skippable with Dave's rough vocal but "So Mystifying" is a solid mellower Ray track that wouldn't sound out of place on either of the next two albums.
They also did a cover of Cadillac... Benny of course went onto ABBA.... this is a cute cover but Hep Stars never tripped my trigger like their Svensk beat contemporaries, Tages and the Namelosers....
Despite generally being of the opinion that The Kinks were weak on covers, I think 'Beautiful Delilah' is actually really good, and a strong start to the album. Interesting that 3 out of the first 4 albums open with Dave on lead vocals. Punchy and proto punkish performance, and Dave barely sounds human: he sounds like some kind of deranged mutoid garage rocking freak from another reality! And that's good! There's no subtlety or respect to their treatment of this cover material, they just trample straight through it, and I wouldn't want it any other way. There's a Gerald Scarfe cartoon from 1964 ish somewhere that I can't find online just now, but that surely must have been inspired by the early Kinks, showing a very grotesque Dave Davies like figure mangling his guitar and and it just is the sound of this track. Have to admit I never liked 'So Mystifying' much. It's resemblance to The Rolling Stones recent hit cover of 'It's All Over Now' in the chorus always kind of distracts me.
To be honest, I had never heard of them prior to this morning, and I had no idea it was Benny in there. Cheers for the info
Beautiful Delilah -- a great song and good band sound by Ray's lead vocal is so annoying....why? While there were some blues singers that may have sung like that, Chuck Berry sure didn't. Skipper. "So Mystifying": the little guitar dealie at the beginning is cool and sounds like a million hits by a million bands to come...the chorus gives me a little thrill too. Otherwise it's not that much, but it's certainly not bad! Good call out on the Dylan-esque vocal that actually pre-dates Dylan actually singing that way -- but I think he was probably going for a bluesy thing (as indeed Dylan may have been too) and, yes, the Mick Jagger influence can't be discounted.
Beautiful Delilah Energetic opener in some ways better than Berry's original. So Mystifying Positive tune, one of Ray's first originals. Love it a great deal. I do remember our twisting to that song. PS: Hep Stars Cool and important Swedish band. Two members, Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus, left the band after a couple of years and founded ABBA!
The Scorpions The Jay-Jays https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsMNhbsIxNE Two Dutch groups with a cover of So Mystifying.
Yep. They took Europe by storm - Denmark, Sweden, France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland and The Netherlands (Holland). Besides they enjoyed a huge TV-presence here.
Plenty of energy in these opening two tracks. "Beautiful Delilah" opens with a nice fill, and Dave provides an unrestrained, unrefined vocal. "So Mystifying" has a great "curly" guitar riff and a memorable chorus even if it is derivative. Better recorded than many of Ray's originals were on the next album. Both are very minor works in the overall Kinks catalogue, but are among the better tracks on this album.
So Mystifying is one of my three favourite tracks on this album, along with You Really Got Me and another track that we'll get to soon (though you probably know which one it is).
Beautiful Delilah Not the best cover of their career, nor their worst. Not counting bootlegs or later-day releases of rejects, BBC performances and live throwaway covers like “Baby Face” from Everybody’s in Showbiz, the Kinks cannon proper consists of—by my count—13 cover songs. (Please correct me if my math is off) Among them, I would rank “Beautiful Delilah” firmly in the middle, at either #6 or #7. Period set lists reveal this to be a live performance standard so they seem well rehearsed and pull it off with ease and confidence…but, I dunno…something about their covers of Chuck Berry (and I am including “Little Queenie” from BBC and bootlegs) always leave me underwhelmed. However, this one is my favorite Kinks Berry cover mostly because of the way they go into a loose, rave-up in the instrumental break. There’s a nice, punk-like energy to it. Overall, by no means an embarrassment, but if their first LP release had been delayed longer to give the band more time to pen a few more originals (as someone earlier in the thread suggested) the album wouldn’t have been hurt by its absence. So Mystifying Other than YRGM, the Ray originals of the first LP are formulaic, clearly inspired by marketing needs. One wonders if manager Larry Page encouraged Ray’s songwriting for its suitability towards cross-use by other artists. “So Mystifying” sounds so targeted to the Rolling Stones (and an earlier post in this thread correctly ID’s it’s similarity to “It’s All Over Now”) that it wouldn’t surprise me that it wasn’t designed to be pitched to Mick, Keith, Brian, et. al. Who knows? Overall, certainly having a Ray original is of more value on the LP than another cover, but in context of their larger body of 1960’s work it is a lesser entry. And a forgettable one at that.
The first time I heard this album (and therefore, these tracks) was when I picked up the 2CD deluxe release in 2011. I also have the album in the 2016 mono vinyl box. "Beautiful Delilah" surprised me because I wasn't used to hearing Dave's voice like this. I quickly warmed up to the rocker it is. I give the band credit for tackling a lesser-known Chuck Berry song. Chuck's single was a flop, only going to 81 in the US and not charting at all in the UK. It came right after the "Roll and Roll Music," "Sweet Little Sixteen," and "Johnny B. Goode" singles -- quite a legendary run! Surprised they opened the album with this, but I don't find anything wrong with it. Strong cover to me. "So Mystifying" has a simple chorus that can be quite the earworm. I enjoy these early tunes. While people have compared it musically to "It's All Over Now" by the Rolling Stones, one may actually compare it lyrically to "Beautiful Delilah." Where this song says "you're so mystifying," "Delilah" often has the phrase "you're so tantalizing." "Mystifying" mentions "you got a mystifying wiggle from your head to your feet" while "Delilah" contains "swinging like a pendulum, walking down the aisle." I can see the similarities between a wiggle and swinging. Thumbs up to these tracks.
Hope I can keep up with the thread in the early release years - I'm a big fan of all of the material up to 1970. Beautiful Delilah was also covered by the Rolling Stones. Both the Kinks and the Stones must have played it live frequently; the Kinks' Shindig version is faithful to the studio take. The Stones played it on the BBC and there also exists a live version on boots; however, the Stones version is not as frantic as the Kinks'. I think the solo in the middle of the Kinks version portends that they were actually capable of an exciting, driving "rave-up" style (already displayed quite well on "It's Alright"). Pete Quaife really zooms up and down the fretboard in a wild yet confident way here, something that garnered the attention of John Entwistle, who greatly admired his playing and gave him rare praise when asked who some of his favorite (contemporary) bass players were... Pete also sings backup vocals here; on Shindig it appears that Ray joins in on the chorus in unison with Dave while Pete continues to harmonize. Dave's solo is wild, and great! The Shindig version proves it's him playing the lead. However... A few of the electric guitar tracks on this album are likely Jimmy Page. On the chorus of Beautiful Delilah, one can hear the distinct sound of a DeArmond tone/volume pedal. Jimmy owned one and used it on many sessions. Dave never used effects much, and there's no tone pedal effects on any Kinks album other than the debut. Hmmm...so I venture to suggest that Jimmy is on additional rhythm guitar on this track (there's three guitars - 2 electrics: 1 lead and 1 rhythm w/tone pedal, and an acoustic). And as far as the next one goes... So Mystifying's "triple pull-off" triplet lick is very much in Jimmy Page's vocabulary, as a session man and as a member of the Yardbirds and LZ. Dave, on the other hand did not use this kind of flashy lick on any subsequent Kinks album. And his lead playing sort of got...worse. On some tracks on Kinda Kinks he sounds like a beginner on lead guitar. I DO think he's on lead on all the singles, and his manic hammer- on and pull-off (but NOT triplets!) playing was super-exciting on the first few singles. And I love his chunky rhythm guitar playing, and his sound in general during the '60's. Listening now to the first album, when there's three guitars (2 electrics and 1 acoustic) it stands to reason that one of the electrics is Jimmy and Ray is on acoustic, except for I've Been Driving on Bald Mountain which has Jimmy on 12-string acoustic, IIRC. Also, another point: So Mystifying, It's Alright, I've Been Driving on Bald Mountain, and later Wonder Where My Baby is Tonight have Pete's really interesting "upside-down" 5th-6th-7th-6th bass lines. Normally this pattern is the higher part of the blues/Chuck Berry rhythm guitar part, above a root note. For the bass player to play this, and avoid the root note entirely, is very weird - and very cool. Kind of daring you to ask - where's the bloody root note Pete? He would play low 5ths of chords often in subsequent songs, as we will see. Moving forward - on I Just Can't Go to Sleep, the tone pedal reappears on the bridge; I think Jimmy is on this too, as an additional rhythm guitarist. The Kinks were understandably defensive about the Dave vs. Jimmy debate on the solos, but back then no one knew Mick Avory wasn't allowed to play on the albums or singles, being replaced at Talmy's insistence with Bobby Graham. "Jimmy just played tambourine" is just a bit of a stretch, as you can really tell when his Gibson Les Paul Black Beauty is in the mix of three guitars, and his tone pedal usage is unique and disappears after this album. Wait until the track "I Need You" comes up. I've got some Jimmy thoughts here too!
I forgot we were doubling down on tracks, so I need to jump on for So Mystifying! One of the few tracks I could remember for the longest time (I'm more familiar now), the chorus definitely hooks you, and I enjoy the verse melody too. it's nothing amazing, but it's plenty decent. When I finally heard the stereo on the 2CD deluxe, I found the panning vocals highly amusing, but also kinda shocking for 1964. Again, shockingly decent stereo on offer.
You should be able to. The two songs a day will only be for the first two, perhaps three albums. Sunday will still be a rest day for catching up and such
FWIW Hinmans day to day book has J. Page on ‘12 string acoustic’ on ‘I’m A Lover Not A Fighter’ ‘Bald Mountain’ and ‘possibly’ ‘Mystifying’, but since contemporary documentation is scarce, a lot of his assignments are well informed guesswork. I could believe Page played more extensive guitar than that on the album. I always understood it Page was brought in on rhythm guitar because Talmy didn’t want Ray singing and playing at the same time.
“I, Dave Davies, invented the distorted guitar sound and played the solo on ‘You Really Got Me’ and Ray Davies played rhythm guitar. We never used ANY other guitarists on any Kinks hits.” Kinks Refute BBC Doc Saying Jimmy Page Played on 'You Really Got Me'
He’s talking about Kinks hits though, which is almost certainly true. But it’s fairly well established that Jimmy Page was around for the recording of the debut album to some extent. Whether he was really needed or not is another matter.
I've been told I have good ears! Seriously though - I think Jimmy was employed as an extra musician on the debut LP, along with Jon Lord and Bobby Graham. I recognize Dave's defensiveness, but he does say "the hits", not on any of "the recordings". Dave was excellent for his age, and did "invent" his amp sound for You Really Got Me, etc. But he didn't use that tone pedal! And I can tell the difference between Jimmy's 3-pickup Les Paul Black Beauty and Dave's Epiphone Casino. I'm always welcome to new information and other opinions. I do study Jimmy's guitar playing as a session man, before the Yardbirds, and he has some guitar "licks" and tendencies (pedals, etc.) that are consistent. Cheers!
Beautiful Delilah The overly affected vocal is distracting enough that I usually dropped the needle at the second cut when I listened to this album. So Mystifying Great guitar lead, cool vocal harmonies, solid energy. A winner.
