OLD GROUND – Ray Davies treads a familiar path on OUR COUNTRY: AMERICANA act II

[email protected] August 3, 2018

Similar to Pete Townshend, from early in his career Ray Davies has regularly avoided the straightforward approach to album making – the notion of five unconnected songs per side not sitting well with two artists who have always had convoluted stories to tell, grander concepts in mind.

As composers-in-chief with The Who and The Kinks, Townshend and Davies have produced some of their finest work when writing to a specific story-line (‘Quadrophenia’/’Arthur‘) although ‘non-concept’ albums such as ‘The Who By Numbers’ or ‘Muswell Hillbillies’ still resonate despite being less ambitious.

Indeed, between 1973 and 1975 The Kinks produced no fewer than four conceptual pieces, Davies writing every song on ‘Preservation Act 1,’ ‘Preservation Act 2,’ ‘Soap Opera,’ and ‘Schoolboys in Disgrace.’ For the most part this sequence of albums alienated The Kinks with the record-buying public and prompted numerous brickbats from the critics – who complained Ray was spreading his considerable talents too thinly on muddled narratives and implausible characters.

In truth, however, things are less straightforward than they seem. Sales were modest to say the least, but each LP contains some fine music (known only to Kinks completists, ‘Sweet Lady Genevieve,’ ‘Sitting In The Midday Sun,’ ‘(A) Face In The Crowd,’ ‘The Hard Way‘ and ‘No More Looking Back‘ are all great songs) the flaw with each album being the story is emphasised to the point of becoming contrived – and in the case of the double-set ‘Preservation Act 2’ laboured until lost.

After a couple of listens to the latest Ray Davies solo offering ‘OUR COUNTRY: AMERICANA act II’ it was the ‘Preservation’ sets of 1973 and 1974 that came to mind – as ‘Our Country‘ follows hot on the heels of the ‘Americana‘ album of last year.

While wishing to avoid making comparisons with albums made 45 years ago, to these ears there are clear similarities – namely, the first album of the pair contains the superior songs and makes all the points needing to be made, while the longer follow-up, despite its merits, offers little new or at times even necessary.

Both albums follow Davies on his journey to explore and understand America, the story told roughly from three different stages in his life; as a child seeing cowboy heroes of the Old West on cinema screens, his first impressions of the US when arriving with The Kinks in 1965 (an ultimately disastrous trip that ends with them being banned from America until 1969) and the terrible affair of him being shot in the leg by a New Orleans mugger in 2004.

Following on from the ‘Americana’ album, ‘Our Country’ is not really continuation more an inferior recount, the themes stretched to a point where they lose impact. If ‘Americana’ was the first course and ‘Our Country’ dessert, then Ray has over-egged the pudding.

The music is pleasant enough, the opening title-cut imbued with an engaging piano melody – but his observations would have benefited from a verse of containing the small details he has so long been the master of conveying.

In re-creating American music he heard in childhood, ‘Back In The Day’ has be-bop swing reminiscent of the Andrews Sisters, while ‘Bringing Up Baby’ is a country shuffle, the title name-checking a popular 1938 American film comedy shown many times on British television – here the lyric cleverly observes how the outlook of a generation changes from one to the next. 

The song would, in fact, along with ‘We Will Get There,’ ‘A Street Called Hope’ and ‘The Empty Room,’ all fit on a Ray Davies solo album without the Americana conceptual umbrella, which does prompt the question of why he felt Act II was needed. 

Certainly not for the spoken word take of ‘The Invaders’ which appears as a fine song on ‘Americana’ (a musical account of The Kinks run-in with US authorities on the ill-fated ’65 visit) and neither for a reprise of ‘The Getaway’ heard in much superior form on his excellent 2006 album ‘Other People’s Lives.’

The song is also referenced in ‘Calling Home’ (which includes a snatch of ‘See My Friends,’) but the biggest nod to The Kinks comes with a re-working of ‘Oklahoma USA,’ the heart-stopping ballad from ‘Muswell Hillbillies.’ Despite the wistful tune losing some of its nuance with a more syrupy arrangement, nothing can detract from the evocative, emotive lyric that dwarfs everything else on the album.

‘The Big Guy’ is an affecting tribute to two former Kinks security men, both of whom have passed away, Ray making the point he would not have been on that particular New Orleans street had either been with him back in 2004. It is followed by a spoken word ‘Epilogue’ that segues into ‘Muswell Kills’ an account of the incident when he was attacked, the chorus naturally including the line ‘Muswell hillbilly boy,’ presumably to emphasise the journey Ray has made from N10 to New Orleans.

The last line of the song, indeed the album, is: ‘So behave, don’t do it again.’

Wise words Ray – Americana is done. Time to concentrate on The Kinks reunion you keep hinting at.

RAY DAVIES – OUR COUNTRY: AMERICANA act II is available on CD.

This article was first published on 3/8/2018.

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NEIL SAMBROOK is the author of MONTY’S DOUBLE – an acclaimed thriller available as an Amazon Kindle Book.