Tuesday, December 5, 2023

Dave Davies - The Bottom Line, New York City, 11-29-1997

It's been too long since I've posted anything related to the Kinks, my second favorite band (after the Beatles, of course). 

This is a great concert by Dave Davies, lead guitarist for the Kinks and brother of the band's lead singer and main songwriter, Ray Davies. (By the way, their last name is pronounced like it's "Davis.") I've posted some of Dave Davies' stuff already, but I just want to reiterate that he gets overlooked due to his more famous and prolific brother. 

If Ray Davies was both the Lennon and McCartney of the Beatles, then it's a very apt comparison to consider Dave Davies the George Harrison of the group. For one, they're both lead guitarists. But also, Dave would write some songs, typically only one an album, but they'd be at the same standard as the rest, and fit in stylistically.

By the time of this concert, the Kinks had petered out, with this last concert in 1996. Naturally, Dave switched to a solo career. In 2000, he released an album called "Rock Bottom: Live at the Bottom Line." The songs on that were selected from a series of concerts at the Bottom Line in late 1997. This was one of those concerts. However, I ran this album through the copyright violation detector at YouTube, and it only found two similarities ("Wicked Annabella" and one of the talking tracks). So I think this has very little overlap in terms of exact performances, even though most of the songs were the same.

In my opinion, this concert is significantly better than the "Rock Bottom" live album. One big advantage is that it's longer by about 20 minutes. So it has all the songs that one has, plus a few more. In terms of sound quality, it's an excellent soundboard, just as good as the official album. Also, I prefer to hear full concerts, warts and all, instead of live albums culled from a bunch of different concerts, so one can get a better sense of what the live experience was really like.

Note that eleven of the songs here were written or co-written by Dave, but eight were solely written by his brother Ray. I believe the Ray ones are tracks 3, 4, 5, 9, 17, 19, 20, 23, and 30. Plus, tracks 11, 29, and 31 are covers.

This album is an hour and 32 minutes long.

01 talk (Dave Davies)
02 Look through Any Doorway (Dave Davies)
03 Wicked Annabella (Dave Davies)
04 I Need You (Dave Davies)
05 She's Got Everything (Dave Davies)
06 talk (Dave Davies)
07 Creepin' Jean (Dave Davies)
08 Love Me Till the Sun Shines (Dave Davies)
09 Tired of Waiting for You (Dave Davies)
10 talk (Dave Davies)
11 Milk Cow Blues (Dave Davies)
12 talk (Dave Davies)
13 It's Too Late (Dave Davies)
14 talk (Dave Davies)
15 Imagination's Real (Dave Davies)
16 talk (Dave Davies)
17 Party Line (Dave Davies)
18 Love Gets You (Dave Davies)
19 Picture Book (Dave Davies)
20 Too Much on My Mind (Dave Davies)
21 talk (Dave Davies)
22 Death of a Clown (Dave Davies)
23 Get Back in Line (Dave Davies)
24 Strangers (Dave Davies)
25 talk (Dave Davies)
26 Fortis Green (Dave Davies)
27 Living on a Thin Line (Dave Davies)
28 talk (Dave Davies)
29 One Night (Dave Davies)
30 All Day and All of the Night (Dave Davies)
31 Money [That's What I Want] (Dave Davies)
32 David Watts (Dave Davies)
33 You're Lookin' Fine (Dave Davies)
34 Lincoln County (Dave Davies)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/mNM5okXX

The cover photo shows Dave Davies playing at this very venue, the Bottom Line in New York City, but in 1999 instead of 1997.

2 comments:

  1. I was at several of his shows at the Bottom Line. Peter Quaife was in the audience at one of the shows and we had a nice chat. Dave was superlative at these shows... really into it.

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  2. Does anyone remember/know whether Dave was the headliner and had an opening act or whether Dave was the opening act and had a headliner at his Bottom Line shows? And, who that other artist might have been? Thanks very much.

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