Dave Davies & Russ Davies - Open Road

New collaboration between Kinks guitarist Dave Davies and son Russ

Legendary Kinks guitarist Dave Davies has been collaborating with his son Russ off and on since 1998's Purusha and the Spiritual Planet, which stepped aside from the riff-based rockers that put him in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and featured more of a spacious, spiritually and cosmically-minded direction.

Their new album, Open Road, was recorded as a collaboration with Davies' son Russ, who is a longtime producer of electronic music. The album explores similar musical territory, and carries a yearning, exploratory mindset that is the antithesis of trying to recreate Davies' sound and style from 1964.

Open Road takes the elder Davies' sharp songwriting skills and fuses them with a sense of musical adventurousness to explore a unique musical space that's unlike any record he's made yet.

"This was truly a collaborative thing," Dave explains to Paste magazine. "Russ would come up with a musical idea, and I would think ‘Okay, where are we going to go with this?'" he says of the writing process, explaining, "Russ has been working in electronic music a long time. He has a really good sense of structure, of placement, of landscapes. He would bring me these amazing musical landscapes and I would work out lyrics and add in my guitar." Those landscapes provide the album with a constantly shifting musical identity, ranging from quieter acoustic moments ("Path Is Long"), to grunge-inspired walls of distorted guitar ("King of Diamonds"), to cosmic electronica ("Chemtrails"), while Russ' deft hand behind the boards provides cohesiveness. "It's good to work with someone you trust," Dave says of letting his son take the reigns on much of the album's musical character, later adding, "When you can sit and listen to someone else's ideas it helps more than it hurts. It's a beautiful thing."

1. Path Is Long

2. Open Road

3. Don’t Wanna Grow Up

4. King Of Diamonds

5. Forgiveness

6. Sleep On It

7. Slow Down

8. Love Has Rules Of It’s Own

9. Chemtrails

Be the first to write a review for this item OR just rate it