Taxman

If anyone has got any opinions about them, I would be thankful if he/she shared them.

I have always thought that while The Kinks are very well appreciated by other musicians, they have never quite get that attention they would deserve

They were highly influential, if you think about it. On the other hand, their early hits like 'You Got Me' pioneered both hard rock and punk. Really, even nowadays 'You Really Got Me' kicks ass.
And think about that riff. I wonder how many time it has been used after that. Also I believe that without that song we wouldn't have the Ramones not to mention many other punk bands... Or maybe not. Somebody had to invent something like that back then.

Anyway, their place in the rock n roll history would have been deserved even if 'You Really Got Me' was their only recording but fortunately it was not.
I deeply believe that Ray Davies invented the whole Britpop genre by himself. Taking influences from British music hall and mixing then with rock was something he did first. And how influential The Kinks really were?
Bands like Blur and Jam are, in some degree, completely Kinks rip-offs. Also I believe many indie pop bands are influenced by them.

Albums from Face To Face to Arthur were pretty revolutionary back then. Music was good but also Ray's lyrics were always very great. Just like little novels, always funny, critical, yet not very poetic and let's face it: very naive.

But we can't rate music if we talk about it's influence. Being that does not exactly mean being good.
Anyway, since this text sucks and is probably very boring, I hope we'll get some kind of discussion about them.

Oh, also one thing. Ray also wrote the greatest song ever about transvestite and how cool is that? I wonder if anyone really knew what those lyrics meant. I mean, I think those lyrics are sympathizing, not accusing or anything, so while Ray seems to be old fashioned, he really is one of the most liberal musicians in his generation.