As a gimmick goes, stripy jackets wasn’t very cool, was it?

The Troggs: I Can’t Control Myself

Last week I watched a TV programme about Dave Davies of the Kinks. In it he said his brother Ray had been playing two notes on the piano and he (Dave) thought that he could do something with it. To get the right effect – not the clean recorded sound they had had up to this – he tried cutting his amp’s loudspeakers with a razor blade, not expecting this to work. The result ended up as You Really Got Me. So maybe it was Dave, and not Ray, who invented heavy metal. Maybe.

The following programme was a retrospective of Kinks performances from the BBC archive which included this gem.

Not a hit at the time – nor was the LP from which it came despite it being a critical success and now much revered – The Village Green Preservation Society prefigures Ray’s movement into the chronicling of Englishness. It hits perfectly that note of wistful nostalgia encompassed by John Major quoting Orwell’s remark about old maids bicycling to Holy Communion. But Ray’s lyrics are a bit more amusing.

The Kinks: The Village Green Preservation Society

This isn’t actually a 60s track as it wasn’t released till 1970. But it feels like one.

Bizarrely there seems to be an extract from Blue Peter at the beginning of this.

However, one of the reasons I’m putting it up is that it features the inventor of bling at the end of the video.

Jethro Tull: Witch’s Promise

Yes. One James Savile esquire.

Not a suggestion of psychedelia or strange substances on this one; just Grace Slick belting out a thumping rock track.

Jefferson Airplane: Somebody To Love

This was the Easybeats last hit in the UK – a slow ballad in contrast to the guitar based Friday On My Mind and the jaunty The Music Goes Round My Head.

The Easybeats: Hello, How Are You?

The Easybeats had a few more singles after Friday On My Mind but didn’t trouble the British charts overmuch.

The Music Goes Round My Head wasn’t a big hit (if it was a hit at all.)

It did however bear a resemblance to a slightly later hit by the group which launched Peter Frampton (the Face of 1968 as I recall) into the world, The Herd.

The Easybeats: The Music Goes Round My Head

The Herd: I Don’t Want Our Loving To Die

The UK B-side to The Easybeats Friday On My Mind was called Made My Bed, Gotta Lie In It.

This was a recording of the band performing the song live, so the quality wasn’t great. The singer’s voice was decidedly ropy. The song’s key was obviously outside his range.

Edited to add: that video has disappeared so this is a replacement.

The Easybeats: Made My Bed, Gotta Lie In It

Some prat on You Tube has titled another version of what seems to be this same clip Made My Bed, Now I Gotta Lay In It. It’s as if they were chickens!