On the day of this posting, it is exactly 22 years since Ray Davies played Rockefeller Music Hall in Oslo, Norway, on 15 April 1998.
It was the first concert I ever attended with my soon-to-be wife, but my second time seeing Ray in concert, having seen The Kinks in the same location on 12 June 1992. This time, Ray Davies was in town to promote his first proper solo release Storyteller.
“Wait,” I hear some of you scream at the top of your voices. “Wasn’t ‘Return To Waterloo’ (1985) his first solo album?” Well done, guy at the back. I hear your desperate cries, and I acknowledge them. Technically you are right, even though everything about that release was tentative. It was labelled a soundtrack album, consisting of songs from the Return To Waterloo movie mixed with recent Kinks album tracks. Availability was limited and it was severely under-promoted. It has not even been regarded as a full-fledged catalogue album that has stayed in print. Hence my use of the phrase “proper solo release” above.
The only way to write a detailed concert review is to do it as soon as possible after the show while everything is fresh in your mind. That is exactly what I did. I posted the review on the Kinks e-mail discussion list, and that was that. As the years went by, I lost the text as the account I had it stored on expired.
I recently came across the review again on an online depository of old Kinks e-mail list digests. It was really great to relive that evening as I ploughed through my old words. I’m glad I shared it all those years ago, giving it a chance to come back to me now.
To commemorate today’s anniversary of this show, here you go – concert notes from 22 years ago!
Jenn and I arrived at Rockefeller around 8:45. We had hoped to be there a little earlier, but we had bad luck with buses so the place was pretty packed. We tried hunting around for vacant seating, and were lucky enough to get two seats not too far from the stage.
I was just wearing a Kinks t-shirt, not being sure if it would be enough for a chilly day, but I was glad that I did because other fans started coming up to us to talk. Maybe it helped that I couldn’t see a single other person wearing anything Kinks-related, which I thought was a bit odd. At least the merchandise booth had brisk t-shirt sales that evening – I managed to get a Storyteller T-shirt myself before they sold out.
We got seating beside some cool people who, as it turned out, were members of the mailing list. Jenn was carrying the Storyteller CD insert in hopes of getting an autograph, and the guy sitting next to us had brought with him the original sleeve of the Apeman/Rats single, hoping for a signature himself. He and Jenn started making loose plans about how to best ambush the stage after the gig to get autographs.
Then it happened. The music from the speakers suddenly came to the forefront and the lights dimmed. We realized that the background music of the venue had morphed into the into music of the show. I was surprised to hear that Ray used an Irish jig as intro music. As the lights dimmed the man himself walked up on stage, casually strolling forward with a copy of “the Black Book” held under one arm and the trademark sly grin on his face. He was met with thunderous applause and cheers. His opening words when things calmed down were “control yourselves!” Laughter and another round of applause.
The first thing he did was introduce his ever faithful sidekick Pete Mathison, then he went on to talk about the guitars he had lined up behind him. “Now, as you can see, I’ve got three guitars on stage with me tonight. This blue one [pointing at a blue electric] is for poetry. The red one [pointing at a red electric] is for rock’n’roll. And finally, the blonde one…” [pointing at an acoustic guitar] “…should have been waiting for me back at the hotel! Now, which one do you want? Poetry or rock’n’roll?”
The majority was calling out for rock’n’roll, which seemed to please Ray. He grinned again, picked up the blue one and strummed it a little bit. “Poetry!” he declared with yet another sly grin. It was clear from the beginning that he was in great spirits that night, and that he would be teasing his audience throughout.
I was very surprised about him opening up with Lola. He played the first chords and I thought “Oh great, he’s going to tease us with it from the beginning!” But he actually went on to play all of it without any “no, I’m sorry, we’re not gonna play that one tonight” at all. I can’t recall that this has been much used as an opening song before, with it usually being a highlight later in the show. Hearing it live once again just made it clear that no matter how tired I may be of this song when listening to music at home, it is ALWAYS great fun to hear it live. It’s odd how that works. It was a smart move opening with it, as the crowd immediately got into the show and from there on Ray was in total control. He followed with Dead End Street, and then the show began proper.
He dedicated the show to all unsuccessful storytellers everywhere (“I am lucky because I have been very successful, but even if you don’t have success and write mostly for yourself: keep writing songs, because one day you might play it in a bar or somewhere, and someone will hear it and pass it on”), and to his friend Frank who died last year (“he used to befriend bartenders, and would tell any story for a drink”).
He made us all laugh again with “I am going to read from the black book tonight… the demented ramblings of a sex-crazed rock’n’roller. If you want to go to the really sleazy stuff…. [then in a low, seedy voice] and I know some of you do… turn to page 355. That should satisfy the lot of you.”
I had picked up the Storyteller CD just a week prior to the show, and it represents the structure of the show well. The album tells a story and follows a certain narrative, with the songs playing their part in it, so the show has to follow suit to a certain degree if he wants to tell that same story.
The main difference was that Ray threw in lots of Kinks-songs at various spots (whenever he felt there was time for a singalong again, probably) and his stories were much less trimmed. Often he would digress, throw in all kinds of funny anecdotes and play the crowd up against his wit.
He is a master showman who knows exactly what to do to keep everybody’s attention and get a reaction. At the same time, this didn’t feel calculated – the feel of the evening was loose, casual, and like he went where inspiration and his memories took him.
Hearing the song Storyteller live was one of the highlights of the show to me. It’s a very good song on the CD, but the live version was so much more poignant. It was as if Ray is looking back on his career with this song, maybe just starting to appreciate how fortunate he has been to have been able to be Storyteller all his life.
I was also struck by how tight Ray and Pete were as a unit. They complement each other wonderfully. I have live tapes of some of their 1995 gigs, and even though they didn’t sound bad then we are talking about two totally different dimensions.
I don’t want to go into too great detail about the show itself, as the CD and previous reports tell you all you need to know about the narrative. Some memorable things should be mentioned though:
As Ray did his intro speech to Victoria, he said “Once, Britain had an Empire”. Someone yelled “…and a football team!”. I don’t think Ray was overly amused, but many of us were (including me).
When he started telling about Dave’s birth, he made it clear that there should be “no applause, please, as the following person is only a minor character in this story”. He knew, of course, that this would ensure the total opposite reaction. When he said Dave’s name, the crowd cheered wildly. Ray went “no! no!” and did those half-hearted arm movements. “Stop it! Silence!” He’s such a master. We could all see he was enjoying himself and just playing up the crowd. Everybody loved it, including RD.
During London Song, there are passages where he keeps mentioning the names of great people from London. At the end of each such passage, this slightly drunk guy at the back would should “…and Ray Davies!”. That got progressively funnier the longer we got into the song. Ray grinned, and people laughed.
Another priceless Ray quote came as he later went on to say “Dave played the guitar the exact same way as he spoke: FxCK FcCK FxCK FxCK FxCK FxCK FxCK!!!”
During Old Black Magic, a song about discovering the opposite sex, he did lots of moves and “simulations”. The man is quite an actor, or should we say performer? It turned out to be one of the funniest moments of the show. After the song he even giggled to himself and said “I can see it now, in all the reviews in tomorrow’s papers… ‘Simulated sex on stage with Ray Davies’.”
At one point Ray got a stout on stage and started telling about his dad. Someone yelled out “Try Norwegian Beer!”, to which Ray replied “I’m not sure I know what you are saying, but I think I can understand the sentiment”.
A song later, he even did his old routine of balancing the beer on top of his head, all the whilst parodying his father’s signature number Minnie the Moocher. In fact I was surprised about how he went into detail about his father’s alcohol abuse and made fun of it and the things his father would do while drunk. Maybe he’s come to terms with it in his own way. It is after all a very long time ago.
It was time for a Kinks song again, but nobody seemed to expect the one we got. Too Much On My Mind was a huge surprise and my personal highlight of the evening. My favourite Kinks song. I was totally blown away by his performance, let alone the surprise that he actually did it. The simultaneous gasp that shot through the crowd as he got into it was evident.
He referred to how lovely Norwegian women are and once again came up with his Bergen reference, as he does every time he plays here. Apparently he has never forgotten Helga who he met when they played there in 1966 (as written about in his book X-Ray)! When The Kinks played in Oslo in 1992 he also mentioned Helga from Bergen and even Olga from Voss. That certainly amazed me at the time.
Nothing lasts forever. After the final chords of You Really Got Me he put down the guitar, bowed, waved and grinned. It seemed like the show was over. Jenn and the guy with the Apeman-sleeve (sorry, I forgot your name!) stormed the stage, but Ray & Pete were quick to get off.
They did reappear for a gorgeous Waterloo Sunset, and one lucky guy was quick enough to make Ray bow down and sign a CD before he went off again, this time for good. Oh well.
Jenn and I hung around for a while, then went outside looking for limos (or the equivalent) without much success. We went back inside again and lurked around the backstage-entrance. Nothing much happened there.
Then suddenly Jenn spotted Pete Mathison on stage among all the roadies, carefully putting his guitars away. We walked up to stage and called for him. One of the roadies nudged him in our direction. “Uh, Mr. Mathison… those people are asking for you.” Pete seemed a little naturally reserved, but was friendly and approachable. After unsuccessfully trying to sign the front of the Storyteller CD insert (the paper was too glossy for the ink-based pen!), he signed it inside next to his own picture. He was in good spirits and told us that this had been the best evening of the tour yet. Part of me thinks this is what a performer always tell the audience on any given evening, but this time I could believe it. This had been one helluva show, and you just know whether the guys on stage have a great time or not. I wish I could remember more of Ray’s seemingly unending list of quips and quotes from this night. The show itself was unforgettable though. As the song goes, I’ll Remember…
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