Razor Blades and Knitting Needles

Ray Davies wrote this with the help of his brother (and Kinks guitarist) Dave. Ray played it for Dave on piano, and Dave tried it on guitar. Their first version was 6-minutes long.

Dave Davies got the dirty guitar sound by slashing the speaker cone on his amp with a razor blade. The vibration of the fabric produced an effect known as "fuzz," which became common as various electronic devices were invented to distort the sound. At the time, none of these devices existed, so Davies would mistreat his amp to get the desired sound, often kicking it. The amp was a cheap unit called an Elpico.

Before they released this, The Kinks put out 2 singles that flopped. If this didn't do well, there was a good chance their record label would have dropped them.

When the Kinks heard the first version they recorded of this, they hated the results. It was produced by Shel Talmy, their manager at the time, and Ray Davies thought it came out clean and sterile, when he wanted it to capture the energy of their live shows. Dave Davies girlfriend backed them up, saying it didn't make her want to "drop her knickers." The Kinks' record company had no interest in letting them re-record this, but due to a technicality in their contract, The Kinks were able to withhold the song until they could do it again. At the second session, Dave Davies slashed his amp and Talmy produced it to get the desired live sound. This is the version that was released.

This was the first hit for The Kinks. It gave them a lot of publicity and led to TV appearances, magazine covers, and 2 gigs opening for The Beatles. They didn't have an album out yet, so they rushed one out to capitalize on the demand. This first album contained only 5 originals, with the rest being R&B covers.

Ray Davies recalled in an interview with NME how his brother Dave created the distortion effect on this song. Said Ray: "We stuck knitting needles in the speakers, or in Dave's case, he slit the speakers with a razor blade. In those days we played records on a radiogram so loudly that they all sounded fuzzy. We thought, 'That's a great sound,' without realizing the speakers were buggered. Everyone else was using really clean guitar sounds, so for 'You Really Got Me' we hooked a little speaker up to a clean amp and came up with thunderous, unaffected, pure power."

WOW

MUNDAKA 24H from aritzaranburu.com on Vimeo.

Some Cool Furniture in Here!

Sustainable Furniture by Jory Brigham Design

Obama to Raise Taxes

to the tune of 1.5 trillion dollars.... I don't understand? if we can't pay for what we spend now how can the solution be to tax us more? Please President Obama stop spending what we don't have, please make some serious cuts with Congress and balance the fucking budget! Please!

Article here.

MLK Sculpture Completed by Chinese Unpaid Workers?

Say it isn't so!
FTA:
"While often overshadowed by his civil rights legacy, King was an outspoken defender of labor rights and was supporting striking sanitation workers in Memphis, Tennessee when he was assassinated. But his memorial was built, in part, using free labor imported from China."

Quote From Rick James in 1981

"Any artist who tells you that they don’t wanna get gold or platinum records is full of shit. Any artist who tells you he’s doing it for the sake of art is full of shit, OK? I am trying to make multi, multi-millions of dollars, I am trying to make Paul McCartney white boy money, so I can sit back and have a big house in Spain and not ever work again. Right now I got a few million dollars and I’m doing all right; I hope to have 20 million soon, so I can sit back real fat like Mick Jagger and Rod Stewart and all them other assholes who sit out there and talk shit and procrastinate and talk that hypocritical ass bullshit about their ‘art’…"
— Rick James, 1981

Isa Scott R.I.P.

Isa Scott, Mother Of Bon Scott, Dies At 94

Wed, 31 Aug 2011

Bon Scott’s mum Isa Scott has died in Western Australia at the age of 94.

Isabelle Cunningham Mitchell married Charles Scott in Scotland in the 1940’s. On July 9, 1946, son Ronald Belford was born.

Isabelle and Charles were known as Isa and Chick. Ronald became known as Bon.

In 1952, Isa and Chick, along with Bon and his younger brother Derek migrated to Melbourne, Australia. In 1953, they had a third son, the Aussie born Graeme.

In 1956, the family moved to Fremantle in Western Australia, where Isa lived for the rest of her life.

Isa remained one of AC/DC’s biggest fans and attended a show on every tour after her son Bon’s death in 1979. She last saw the band live as a VIP guest at the AC/DC show at Subiaco Oval on March 6, 2010.

R.I.P. Isa.

SLAP Interviews Max Schaaf

End of Summer Mix

another decent mix from the HOOD INternet

Definition of Bad-Ass?

Having lung cancer and still helping me fell a tree. BAD ASS!

Frozen Ghost

I love the bottle design and graphics, but a man stuck in a bottle of booze might make some people are little sweaty.

Frozen Ghost Vodka

For Me - this is as close as biking gets to skateboarding

Danny Macaskill just killing it, again.


not only is the riding spot-on, but so is the filming and the score. Sound and Vision once again!

30 Harsh Musicians on Musicians Quotes

man, there are some gems in here Here's a couple:

Robert Smith on Morrissey
“If Morrissey says not to eat meat, then I’ll eat meat — that’s how much I hate Morrissey.”

Nick Cave on Red Hot Chili Peppers
“I’m forever near a stereo saying, ‘What the fuck is this garbage?’ And the answer is always the Red Hot Chili Peppers.”

Fred Perry to Release Amy Winehouse Collection

She did some nice stuff for Fred Perry

Tons of Records in London Destroyed by Riots

Numerous independent record labels fear they have lost a catastrophic amount of stock in a fire at a distribution warehouse in north London during the riots in the capital on Monday night. A three-storey, 20,000 square-metre building in Enfield, owned by Sony DADC and holding stock to be distributed by the Pias Group, was burned to the ground.

Oh man, what a waste.

Van Halen and the Brown M&M's

The 1980s was a heady and decadent time for rock stars. Stories of bad behavior by some of rock’s finest - be it trashing hotel rooms or simple prima donna demands - were splashed all over the headlines. And few of those stories were as famous as the “Van Halen and M&Ms” story.
Here’s the thing, though: the band put the “no brown M&Ms” clause in their contracts for a very good reason.

"For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can't readily accept the God formula, the big answers don't remain stone-written. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command nor faith a dictum. I am my own god. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us."
- Charles Bukowski

Budweiser's New Can Design

I like it, but I'll have see in person and of course sample the contents so as to make sure nothing else has changed.

Mission Bartenders

some nice watercolors and thoughts in this one

Chelsea Hotel to Close

Punk rock and poetic icon, NY history to close to guests.