(Credits: Far Out / Alamy)
Sun 18 January 2026 13:30, UK
It’s often forgotten just how influential Dave Davies’ guitar technique really was.
His elder brother and Kinks frontman, Ray, isn’t without an endless shower of plaudits and accolades, celebrated as one of the finest songwriters the UK has ever birthed, with special praise afforded to his unique lyrical pen’s capture of the English sensibility. Yet, in the rock and pop canon, Dave Davies doesn’t often spring to mind when considering the all-time guitar greats.
It’s partly down to his lack of showboating. Despite boasting a dextrous handling of both rhythm and lead, Davies always remained tethered to the integrity of the song, coating Ray’s lion’s share of the songwriting with colourful melody lines that never distracted from what was needed in the moment. Then there were the power chords and distortion. Leaving an impression on future heavy metal and punk, ‘You Really Got Me’s meaty garage riffage would show that rawness need not impede pop appeal, the 1964 hit launching them to the States during the British invasion.
Much of the era’s guitar maestros would namecheck Davies’ inventive use of sonic abrasion, Pete Townshend taking notes on ‘You Really Got Me’s aggression, the distortion providing pointers to future Yardbirds and Cream hits, and prompting heavy Black Sabbath lord Tony Iommi to down-tune his strings.
Another budding guitarist paying close attention was Jimmy Page. Before finding fame with Led Zeppelin, Page had racked up countless recording credits as an in-demand session guitarist, laying down tracks for everybody from The Rolling Stones, The Who, and Marianne Faithfull, plus a slew of soundtracks and stock library muzak. From this period, longstanding rumours abounded that Page, in fact, cut the lead solos on many of their early work while working with the producer behind many of The Kinks’ early classics.
“You see, Jimmy Page was a friend of Shel Talmy’s, and was a session player who used to hang around and hope that he could get in on sessions,” Davies clarified to Guitar Player in 1990. “And we locked him out.”
“But he learned a lot, you know, like the many other people who wouldn’t admit borrowing from the Kinks,” Davies curtly added. “And I suppose when he became successful himself, all credit due to him, his ego was so inflated he probably thought he invented the bloody instrument anyway, being carried along on that crystal and glamour.”
You’d need ego to co-steer one of the most lauded rock groups in history, as well as boasting one of The Yardbirds’ lauded guitarist roles, along with Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton, for good measure. Still, Page has never fed such mythos, and it’s certain that he indeed secured session work on The Kinks’ debut album, playing an acoustic twelve-string on ‘I’m a Lover Not a Fighter’, ‘I’ve Been Driving on Bald Mountain’, and possibly B-side ‘I Gotta Move’.
But learnt a lot, he did, Page owing much to The Kinks’ foundational distortion blast, just as much of the rock world owes a debut to Davies’ novel and inspired moment of amplifier desecration to conjure ‘You Really Got Me’s raucous swagger.
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