Oh look, Ray Davies has decided a Kinks reunion is a long way off once more – but this time it’s Dave Davies and drummer Mick Avory who are the problem.
The civil war between Ray and Dave has traditionally been seen as the biggest obstacle in the way of a return for one of Britain’s most celebrated bands, but that obstacle had looked much more passable recently after the brothers’ volatile relationship was reported to have cooled in the wake of amicable meetings which started in the summer of 2013.
However, it wasn’t just the siblings who had a tempestuous kinship bubbling not far under The Kinks surface. Dave Davies and Avory’s love-hate affair also exploded in public on more than one occasion – perhaps most famously when the drummer hurled one of his cymbals at Davies during a Cardiff gig in 1965 after the guitarist was famously reported as telling him: “Your drumming is sh*t – they’d sound better if you played them with your c*ck.”
And in a new interview with The Telegraph, Ray has said it is this rivalry which is now standing in the way of a return for the band. “I really can’t play with my brother as that name, the Kinks, and not have Mick in,” he said.
“Mick will work with him but Dave doesn’t want to work with Mick. Sibling rivalry is nothing on their rivalry. I have no idea what’s wrong with them.”