The Dog Still Has His Bark

By: Douglas Wayne Bentley

A Tribute to Ray and Dave Davies

Founding Members of the Kinks

Originally posted on Sunday, October 8, 2006

Reposted Tuesday, June 30, 2009

I was surfing late night

I could not believe who I came across

There was Ray Davies performing on PBS

Saturday night, October 7, 2006

On Austin City Limits

I was amazed

First of all that he was on TV

Second of all that he was promoting his first solo CD

(I wanted to say album)

Yes, after 42 years of recording

There he was. . . . .

Many bands have come and gone

Played many a song

Few got along

Brothers Remarkable

That voice

(Who didn’t want to sing)

That guitar riff

That lyric

So distinguishable

Instantly recognizable

Drummers and basses come and go

Many different faces

Change places

Even wilder stories of how these brothers got along

There he was. . . . . . . .

I remember their first hit

I remember their last

Forty two years had past

My how time goes by

He played ‘20^th Century Man’

I sensed he was still afraid to die

I wondered if his brother was about to. . . . .cry

I realized, most in the audience weren’t even born yet

When they came on the London music scene

They wanted to be different.

And I can truly say

They were

Something Else

To take me back in time

Relive

Rethink

Oh, those were the Kinks!

And there he was. . . . . . .

With new songs

(Go out and buy ‘Other People’s Lives’ )

(I would also recommend ‘The Storyteller’)

Yes, he played some old ones too

Gave away a secret or two

He had to have given hope in every unknown band out there

When he told the first recording company rejected their first hit.

Said they sounded like a barking dog

Said that’s exactly what they were attempting to do

BARK!

Then that’s what he did

He barked out ”All Day and All the Night”

To my delight.