Ray Davies Reviews Revolver

Paul McCartney was one of the most competitive people I've ever met. Lennon wasn't. He just thought everyone else was sh*t 

Ray Davies (The Kinks) in Revolver: How the Beatles Reimagined Rock 'n' Roll by Robert Rodriguez

As well as that gem, here's another I found via Rodriguez's book - Ray's review of Revolver for Disc and Music Echo Magazine in Aug '66

'Really, it's a load of RUBBISH'

Taxman - It sounds like a cross between the Who and Batman. It's a bit limited, but the Beatles get over this by the sexy double-tracking. It's surprising how sexy double-tracking makes a voice sound.

Eleanor Rigby - I bought a Haydn LP the other day and this sounds just like it. It's all sort of quartet stuff and it sounds like they're out to please music teachers in primary schools. I can imagine John saying: 'I'm going to write this for my old schoolmistress'.

I'm Only Sleeping - It's a most beautiful song, much prettier than 'Eleanor Rigby'. A jolly old thing, really, and definitely the best track on the album.

Love You Too - This sort of song I was doing two years ago--now I'm doing what the Beatles were doing two years ago. It's not a bad song--it's well performed which is always true of a Beatles track.

Yellow Submarine - This is a load of rubbish, really. I take the mickey out of myself on the piano and play stuff like this.

Good Day Sunshine - This'll be a giant. It doesn't force itself on you, but it stands out like I'm Only Sleeping. This is back to the real old Beatles. I just don't think the fans like the newer electronic stuff. The Beatles are supposed to be like the boy next door only better.

Got To Get You Into My Life - It just goes to prove that Britain's jazz musicians can't swing.

Tomorrow Never Knows - Listen to all those crazy sounds! It'll be popular in discotheques. I can imagine they had George Martin tied to a totem pole when they did this!

So, after listening to each track three or four times, the Ray Davies verdict: This is the first Beatles LP I've really listened to in it's entirety but I must say there are better songs on 'Rubber Soul'.

Go to KindaKinks.Net to read the whole review

Baby You Can Drive My Truck

No posts this week as I've been so busy doing gigs with students and posting series on how David Allen's GTD (Getting Things Done) personal management system can help you with songwriting. Oh and songwriting of course.

Here's something to get your heads round while I get my head round Something. Dominic Pedler, author of brilliant Songwriting Secrets of the Beatles (which I'll be trying to read in the half term holidays) penned a brilliant article on the truck drivers key change. Where is it? On a web site solely devoted to suddenly upward key changes. It's niche world out there.

One interesting observation is how sparingly the Beatles used it - four times in 186 songs. Whereas Whitney Houston seems to use at least one in every song she records... here's a sample

Penny Lane


The charge:
A blatant truck driver's modulation as the penultimate chorus in A major is repeated, verbatim, a whole step up, in the key of B.


The defence:
If you look at in isolation, then yes, your honour, guilty as charged. Look at the song as a whole, however, and you'll see that it is not a truck driver's shift at all, but an inspired twist which creates structural unity in one of Macca's finest compositions.


Up until this closing gambit, what we have is a chorus in a key a whole step below that of the verse. It's a brilliant twin-key scheme that serves famously to delineate McCartney's detailed observations in the verse key of B, with the euphoric sing-along celebrations in the chorus key of A...faced with the problem of how to end this type of structure Macca opts for a truck driver's shift into second gear – but notice that, ingeniously, his target is not some contrived new harmony, rather the tonic that originally started the song!


Read the rest of the article here