Is the "Session Man" by the Kinks is about Jimmy Page?

[zeppphead]

Here are the lyrics (I read Sarcasm):

He never will forget at all

The day he played at the Albert Hall.

A million sessions ago it seems.

He is a session man,

A chord progression,

A top musician.

Rock 'n' roll or vocal star [could be "folk group star" or "Vaudeville star"],

A philharmonic orchestra,

Everything comes the same to him.

He is a session man,

A chord progression,

A top musician.

He's not paid to think, just play,

A session man

A session man

A session man

Playing at a different studio every day.

He reads the dots and plays each line,

And always finishes on time.

No overtime nor favors done.

He is a session man,

A chord progression,

A top musician.

He's not paid to think, just play,

A session man

A session man

A session man

From http://www.lyricstime.com/kinks-session-man-lyrics.html

And Ray Davies Interview with Creem Magazine, when he was asked about Pagey:

About Jimmy Page playing those early leads?

Yeah.

I'lltell you something about Jimmy Page. Jimmy Page thinks he was the firstperson in the world to ever put a B string where a G string should be.And for me, that's his only claim to fame. Other than that, I thinkhe's an asshole. You see, when there was a new pop group like theKinks, you got all sorts of people coming to the sessions and wantingto sit in. There were a lot of groups going around at the time—theYardbirds, the Kinks, the Rolling Stones—and nobody had really crackedwith a sort of R&B number one record. The songs were always sort oflike the Beatles. When we first wanted to do a record, we couldn't geta recording gig. We were turned down by Decca, Parlophone, EMI and evenBrian Epstein came to see us play and turned us down. So I startedwriting songs like "You Really Got Me", and I think there was a sheerjealousy that we did it first. Because we weren't a greatgroup—untidy—and we were considered maybe a bit of a joke. But for somereason, I'd just had dinner, shepherd's pie, at my sister's house, andI sat down at the piano and played da, da, da, da, da. The funny thingis it was influenced by Mose Allison more than anybody else. And Ithink there was a lot of bad feeling. I remember we went to clubs likethe Marquee, and those bands wouldn't talk to us because we did it first

Youmust know the story of "You Really Got Me". It was recorded first atPye with a producer who made it sound like Phil Spector, and there wasno way that I was going to let them put it out. I said I'd leave themusic business first because I'd never write another song like it. Inthe end, they gave us 200 pounds—which is like 400 bucks—to re-recordit. We went into a cheap little studio, and on the session was MickAvory on drums, Dave Davies playing lead guitar—playing a Harmonyguitar which was like a cheap version of a Gibson—I was playing a Matonwhich is a cheap version of a Harmony. I had a Wallace amplifier whichwas custom built. Dave was using a Vox and a little six watt pre-ampwith knitting needles stuck in it. We had Arthur Greenslade—a sessionpianist—on piano, and a guy named Vic who was doubling my part becauseI was singing lead. So there were three guitars and a piano doing theriff. And for all I know, Jimmy Page must have been having dinner withhis mother that night.

JimmyPage and a lot of other people subsequently came to our sessions whenwe became hot, and I think he played rhythm 12-string on "I'm A Lover,Not A Fighter", and he played tambourine on "Long Tall Shorty". JonLord, the organist of Deep Purple, played organ on ‘Bald Headed Woman’.The curious thing is I wrote a song called "Revenge" which had a rifflike "You Really Got Me". Our publisher at the time was a man namedLarry Page. To get a part of the action—this was a real con trick—heregistered the song as a co-composer, and he wasn't even on the sessionfor the demo. So maybe the fact that Larry Page was credited asco-composer of Revenge" adds some substantial evidence to Jimmy Page'sclaim.

Iremember Page coming to one of our sessions when we were recording "AllDay And All Of The Night". We had to record that song at 10 o'clock inthe morning because we had a gig that night. It was done in threehours. Page was doing a session in the other studio, and he came in tohear Dave's solo, and he laughed and he snickered. And now he says thathe played it! So I think he's an asshole, and he can put all the curseshe wants on me because I know I'm right and he's wrong. He's anasshole. Dave is a great guitar player. He's got his limitations, buthe's never been given justice for doing that. He made that when he was16-years-old. He created a sound, and after that came Jimi Hendrix andall the fuzz boxes.

From http://www.creemmagazine.com/_site/BeatGoesOn/Kinks/UnravelsTheKinks001.html

Pagey, on the other hand has always shown his generosity, and spoke highly of Ray's skills as a musician.

[SteveAJones]

SHEL TALMY Shel Talmy was one of the most important and influential rock producers of the 1960s. Raised in Chicago and trained as a recording engineer in Los Angeles, he moved to Britain in 1962, bluffed his way into a producer position at Decca Records, and soon became one of the U.K.'s first independent producers. Most famous for his work on the earliest discs by the Kinks and the Who, he also produced dozens of other artists of the era, including the Pentangle, Manfred Mann, the Easybeats, David Bowie (when the singer was still known as David Jones), and cult acts such as the Creation and Rumpelstiltskin.

How did some of the groups you produced react to having sessionmen on their recordings? There's been a big controversy over whether Jimmy Page played solos on Kinks records, for example.

You know how many times I've answered that question? I wish I had a buck for each one. Jimmy Page did not play the solo on "You Really Got Me," he played rhythm guitar. He never played anything but rhythm guitar on that plus [the Kinks'] first album session. On "You Really Got Me," the Kinks had just added Mick [Avory], and I used Bobby Graham on drums. He played rhythm guitar because at the time Ray would not play rhythm guitar, he didn't think he was good enough. So I said, fine, let me get a rhythm guitarist, 'cause Dave [Davies] was playing the leads. We had Jon Lord on organ.

...this from a 1977 interview with Jimmy Page conducted by Steven Rosen:

You were also doing all sorts of things with feedback?

JP: You know, “I Need You” (Kinkdom) by the Kinks? I think I did that bit there in the beginning. I don’t know who really did feedback first; it just sort of happened. I don’t think anybody consciously nicked it from anybody else. It was just going on. But Pete Townshend (lead guitarist with the Who) obviously was the one, through the music of his group, who made the use of feedback more his style, and so it’s related to him. Whereas the other players like Jeff and myself were playing more single note things than chords.

-----------------------------------------------

So far as I know Jimmy's never claimed to have performed the solo on 'You Really Got Me', but his involvement as a rhythm guitarist on that session and others is irrefutable. I seriously doubt The Kink's song 'Session Man' is a direct

reference to Jimmy Page, rather it is a reference to session musicians in general. Interesting to note the 2007 release

of Led Zeppelin's 'The Song Remains The Same' dvd had to be recalled because of copyright infringement - The Kink's

'You Really Got Me' had not been removed as background music during the Cameron Crowe interview of Page done

around the time of the film's original theatrical release. If I recall correctly, Jimmy's comments then are consistent with what Shel Talmy said more recently (in the post above) - that Jimmy was on rhythm guitar.

[Deborah J]

Ray Davies - how dare he call Jimmy an asshole. This is why to this day I don't believe 99% of what I read when it comes to things printed about LZ.

[zeppphead]

Ray Davies - how dare he call Jimmy an asshole. This is why to this day I don't believe 99% of what I read when it comes to things printed about LZ.

Ray Davies and Pete Townshend along with Jack Bruce (although three amazing musicians; and I like them all) are a bunch of jealous bitches.

C'mon! This is Creem Magazine's, one of the most authentic rock magazines, official website (and I also own the magazine in print). Articles and opinions could be delusive and off-key, while Interviews tend to be authentic, because an interviewee can always sue the interviewer, in case of his/her severe misinterpretation.

[SteveAJones]

Ray Davies and Pete Townshend along with Jack Bruce (although three amazing musicians; and I like them all) are a bunch of jealous bitches.

Ray's not obliged to like Jimmy Page, nor anyone else for that matter, but they could all learn a lot from Jagger insofar

as how to be more diplomatic in their responses. For example, when Mick was asked who was the better act between

The Beatles and The Stones, he stated "You can prefer them to us or us to them, it doesn't really matter".

[59LesPaul]

Ray Davies - how dare he call Jimmy an asshole.

I think he's an asshole

"How dare he" have an opinion?

Granted,it's not a positive one,but he's still entitled to it. I don't agree with him,but I think it's somewhat refreshing to hear an opinion that isn't blind hero-worship.

I don't know Jimmy Page,and I'll never claim to,but I have a hunch he doesn't give a damn what Ray Davies thinks of him.

[PlanetPage]

SHEL TALMY Shel Talmy was one of the most important and influential rock producers of the 1960s. Raised in Chicago and trained as a recording engineer in Los Angeles, he moved to Britain in 1962, bluffed his way into a producer position at Decca Records, and soon became one of the U.K.'s first independent producers. Most famous for his work on the earliest discs by the Kinks and the Who, he also produced dozens of other artists of the era, including the Pentangle, Manfred Mann, the Easybeats, David Bowie (when the singer was still known as David Jones), and cult acts such as the Creation and Rumpelstiltskin.

How did some of the groups you produced react to having sessionmen on their recordings? There's been a big controversy over whether Jimmy Page played solos on Kinks records, for example.

You know how many times I've answered that question? I wish I had a buck for each one. Jimmy Page did not play the solo on "You Really Got Me," he played rhythm guitar. He never played anything but rhythm guitar on that plus [the Kinks'] first album session. On "You Really Got Me," the Kinks had just added Mick [Avory], and I used Bobby Graham on drums. He played rhythm guitar because at the time Ray would not play rhythm guitar, he didn't think he was good enough. So I said, fine, let me get a rhythm guitarist, 'cause Dave [Davies] was playing the leads. We had Jon Lord on organ.

...this from a 1977 interview with Jimmy Page conducted by Steven Rosen:

You were also doing all sorts of things with feedback?

JP: You know, “I Need You” (Kinkdom) by the Kinks? I think I did that bit there in the beginning. I don’t know who really did feedback first; it just sort of happened. I don’t think anybody consciously nicked it from anybody else. It was just going on. But Pete Townshend (lead guitarist with the Who) obviously was the one, through the music of his group, who made the use of feedback more his style, and so it’s related to him. Whereas the other players like Jeff and myself were playing more single note things than chords.

-----------------------------------------------

So far as I know Jimmy's never claimed to have performed the solo on 'You Really Got Me', but his involvement as a rhythm guitarist on that session and others is irrefutable. I seriously doubt The Kink's song 'Session Man' is a direct

reference to Jimmy Page, rather it is a reference to session musicians in general. Interesting to note the 2007 release

of Led Zeppelin's 'The Song Remains The Same' dvd had to be recalled because of copyright infringement - The Kink's

'You Really Got Me' had not been removed as background music during the Cameron Crowe interview of Page done

around the time of the film's original theatrical release. If I recall correctly, Jimmy's comments then are consistent with what Shel Talmy said more recently (in the post above) - that Jimmy was on rhythm guitar.

...tks for the proof here, grown up jealous men (Icons yet, each and every one of them!!)....that's all it is...there is no need to further this cause...

[NickZepp]

Ray Davies seems to me to not really like anyone except himself. He could be more like Clapton who has said in the past that he doesn't really like Zeppelin's music all that much but he respects Jimmy as a friend and a musician.

[BIGDAN]

Hi All,

The Davies Brothers are bunch of Gobby Thugs, while James Patrick Page is a Gentleman, always was, is now, and always will be. Nuff Said.

Remember how they treated Slade on Top of the Pops in the 70s? No? Ave a look then.

http://www.cantstopt...ing.com/?p=6889

Regards, Danny

[zeppphead]

James Patrick Page is a Gentleman, always was, is now, and always will be. Nuff Said.

Exactly. I'll give you two more examples:

1-a) Jimmy Page about Eddie Van Halen:

Do you listen to someone like Edward Van Halen and the way in which he uses a tremolo arm?

JP: I am extremely aware of him, actually, and Itake my hat off to him for working out that technique [referring to VanHalen's pioneering of the hammer-on technique]. You know, you talkabout what I've done on the guitar and that's what he's done on theguitar. As far as it goes, it's an incredible technique for what hedoes. I must say that. I can't do it. I can't smile like him either.It's a really good technique but as I said I can't play like that.

That's what we were talking about earlier: we're talking about extremes now. That's what's so good about guitar players.

1-b Eddie Van Halen about Jimmy Page:

"Jimmy Page is an excellent producer. Led Zeppelin 1 and Led Zeppelin 2 are classics. As a player. He's very good in the studio. I never saw him play well live. He's very sloppy. He plays like he's got a broken hand and he's two years old. But if you put out a good album and play like a two-year-old live. What's the purpose?" - Guitar World, January 1981

Rethinking Jimmy Page:"He's a genius. He's a great player, a songwriter, a producer. Put it this way, he might not be the greatest executor of whatever, but then you hear a Page solo, he speaks. I've always said Clapton was my main influence, but Page was actually more the way I am, in a reckless-abandon kind of way." - Guitar World, February 1990

I think Eddie was just being arrogant early on in his career. By 1990,Van Halen weren't as popular and he had more perspective and realizedwhat an influential player and genius Jimmy Page really was/is.

2-a) Jimmy Page about Bert Jansch:

Did you ever meet any of those folk players you admire—Bert Jansch, John Renbourn or any of them?

JP: No, and the most terrifying thing of allhappened about a few months ago. Jansch's playing appeared as if it wasgoing down or something, and it turns out he's got arthritis. I reallythink he's one of the best. He was, without any doubt, the one one whocrystallized so many things. As much as Hendrix had done on electric, Ithink he's done on the acoustic. He was really way, way ahead. And forsomething like that to happen is such a tragedy, with a mind asbrilliant as that. There you go.

Another player whose physical handicap didn't stop him is DjangoReinhardt. For his last LP they pulled him out of retirement to do it.He'd been retired for years and it's fantastic. You know the storyabout him in the caravan and losing fingers and such. But the record isjust fantastic. He must have been playing all the time to be thatgood—it's horrifyingly good. Horrifying. But it's always good to hearperennial players like that, like Les Paul, and people like that.

2-b Bert Jansch about Jimmy Page:

The thingI've noticed about Jimmy

---

whenever we meet is that he can't lookme in the eye. Well, heripped me off , didn't he? -Classic Rock, 2007

[SteveAJones]

I never saw him play well live. He's very sloppy. He plays like he's got a broken hand and he's two years old.

The first time Eddie Van Halen saw Jimmy Page perform live was at The Forum in Los Angeles on June 25, 1972.

Jimmy's performance that night was exceptional. However, if Eddie caught them the following year as well (May

31, 1973) it's ironic to note Jimmy did perform that night with a sprained finger.

Despite what Eddie said back then, the two became friends in the early 90s. When Jimmy was in Los Angeles for a few days in January 2004 he spoke with him on the phone after Eddie called Ross Halfin over 20 times during

their stay trying to reach Jimmy.

[Black Dawg]

Ray Davies is a talented artist that I enjoy. That being said; Ray Davies is such a putz in his personal affairs his own brother can't stand his ass.

"You Really Got Me" suddenly made the Kinks stars. As Dave tells it, while he and the rest of the band popped pills, drank themselves blind, and had sex with everyone (boys as well as girls, Dave cheerfully reveals), Ray brooded and watched his money. Dave says Ray denied him songwriting credit for his contributions to many Kinks songs; more generally, Ray is "abusive . . . cruel and creatively draining . . . venomous, spiteful, and completely self-involved." One is left thinking that only Dave's forbearance has allowed the band to survive for so long. The Kinks have endured many creatively and commercially fallow periods, and the author suffered from depressions so severe that tours were cancelled. In 1982, though, he had a cosmic awakening, consisting of a visitation by five "intelligences" who gave him "irrefutable knowledge of the `Etheric Planes.' "

The problem with hero worship is that 'they don't wanna be like everyboby else'. The key here is to seperate art from the artist an realise they are flawed just like the rest of us.

[59LesPaul]

Ray Davies is a talented artist that I enjoy. That being said; Ray Davies is such a putz in his personal affairs his own brother can't stand his ass.

"You Really Got Me" suddenly made the Kinks stars. As Dave tells it, while he and the rest of the band popped pills, drank themselves blind, and had sex with everyone (boys as well as girls, Dave cheerfully reveals), Ray brooded and watched his money. Dave says Ray denied him songwriting credit for his contributions to many Kinks songs; more generally, Ray is "abusive . . . cruel and creatively draining . . . venomous, spiteful, and completely self-involved."

So,I guess a reunion is out of the question?

[PlanetPage]

Robert Quine and Chris Spedding - discuss their views here in this article link below: James Patrick Page The Definition of a Guitar Hero - Guitar World July 1986

The B-Sides To Infinity/"He Really Got Me"

Robert Quine...

"...The Solo he did on "You Really Got Me" - I believe he did that, I don't think it could've been Dave Davies - has those qualities: an absolutely and deliberately repetitive, brutal solo with an incredible tone and one little lick thrown in there just to show you, "Hey I can play as fast as I want to but I'm deliberately doing this." And this was years before anybody knew his name."

Chris Spedding

"...I read somewhere in a magazine where me, Jimmy Page and Dave Davies were all credited with playing the solo on a Kinks record. "You Really Got Me." I know that I didn't do it, I don't think Jimmy Page did it. I think it's probably Dave Davies, but who cares? Who can remember [laughs]? We were all supposed to have kept quite about it anyway."

[zeppphead]

Robert Quine...

"...The Solo he did on "You Really Got Me" - I believe he did that, I don't think it could've been Dave Davies - has those qualities: an absolutely and deliberately repetitive, brutal solo with an incredible tone and one little lick thrown in there just to show you, "Hey I can play as fast as I want to but I'm deliberately doing this." And this was years before anybody knew his name."

Great one!

[kaiser]

"Session Man" is about Nicky Hopkins. It's actually fresh in my mind because I just read that bit of info in When Giants Walked The Earth but I had read that earlier in a Nicky Hopkins obituary some time ago.

[zeppphead]

Nicky Hopkins

Such wonderful and underrated player, was in the league of his own.

[kaiser]

Such wonderful and underrated player, was in the league of his own.

Some of my favorite Who & Stones songs would not be the same without him. "The Song Is Over" & "Loving Cup" are just gorgeous. A very wonderful & underrated player as you noted.

[Walter]

Some of my favorite Who & Stones songs would not be the same without him. "The Song Is Over" & "Loving Cup" are just gorgeous. A very wonderful & underrated player as you noted.

I enjoy those songs as well as his work with Jeff Beck on the Truth album. Underrated for sure!

[zeppphead]

I enjoy those songs as well as his

She's a Rainbow- one of the most beautiful songs by the Stones with string arrangements by Jonesy.

[zeppphead]

I've read somewhere that when Nicky died, he left his wife with a six-figure hospital bill as he didn't have any health insurance. When Charlie got to know about that, he sympathized with Nicky's widow and paid the amount in full; not Jagger or Richards....