Alaska Employment Law

Raymond Douglas Davies, Tuesday night at the Berklee Performance Center

1.  Boy, were there ever a lot of old people there, even a wheelchair contingent.  More trips to the bathroom at a concert than I ever saw in my life.  My daughter was the second youngest person there.  Memo to self:  Go see some current band that’s interesting to people in their 20s and 30s.  Even 40s.

2.  Good opening, with the rocker “I Need You” done quietly, followed by a fine version of “I’m Not Like Everybody Else,” to get the audience bonding started. 

3.  I miss Dave Davies, Ray’s brother and former Kinks lead guitarist (the man who tore a hole in his speaker cone with a knitting needle in order to get that dirty sound on “You Really Got Me”).  The band last night was a little too clean (musically and otherwise) for my taste.  With Dave things were always at risk of coming apart, and his guitar style is unique.  The players last night weren’t unique, just really talented.  That drummer was pretty good but could never be the Kinks drummer.  Come back, Mick Avory.  Ray’s best post-Kinks concerts were The Storyteller concerts, where he played and read excerpts from his excellent autobiography, X-Ray.  That show did not need anyone else.

4.  Did Ray break a string at the start of “The Tourist”?  I felt like we had a full two or three minutes of Booker T & the MGs there, while Ray messed with his guitar.  I have never seen Ray change guitars so often in a performance, and I have seen him a dozen times.  Ray explained that “The Tourist” was really about New Orleans (where Ray lived for a while, managing to get mugged and shot in the leg while he did so), which is an interesting comment, since when I first heard the song I thought it was about southeast Asia.

5.  Ray’s audience is just dying to be given instructions.  And Ray obliges.  We substituted for the chorus on “Waterloo Sunset.”  I wish he had done the reggae version of “Til the End of the Day.”

6.  The couple next to me and my daughter were stoned when they arrived (based on reefer smell), drank little booze nips in their seats, never stood up, and the guy kept asking for “Lola.”  When Ray finally got to “Lola,” the guy and the woman got up and left.  In the middle of the song.

7.  I really miss Dave Davies.  The tension between the brothers makes better music (are you listening, Liam Gallagher?)  Get well soon, Dave.  Supposedly he is undertaking a mini-tour in February.

8.  Fortunately, Ray has a sense of irony about his music.  He knows he’s 65, he knows his audience is older too, and he does not take himself too seriously.  Or too lightly, which is just as important.

9.  A fun, professional show.  Ray Davies is among the finest songwriters of his generation, a generation that includes Peter Townshend, Mick and Keith, and John and Paul.  As a songwriter, Ray walks in that crowd.  When the Kinks were out of fashion, Boston audiences always remained rabid.  I think Ray actually appreciates that.