I ran into my ex-father-in-law at the gas station this morning. When I was married to his daughter we shared a love of motorcycles, classic horror movies and rock n roll records. He's a very cool guy and we are still friends, though we don't get to spend much time together as we used to.
In the mid 60s when he was a young man starting his career as a news photographer he got an assignment to film the Kinks on their first American tour as they swung through his home state of Illinois. He still has an unseen reel of the Kinks performing live in (I think) Champaign, IL. I've asked him about it a couple times. He always describes Ray and Dave Davies as complete asses; two English pricks who were always (fist) fighting with each other and generally making everyone else miserable.
A couple summers ago I read a great piece in MOJO about that very tour. As it turned out, the promotor for central Illinois was none other than John Wayne Gacy, the infamous pederast and serial killer. It seems Mr. Gacy took a very unnatural liking to young Dave Davies and wasnt shy about telling him so.
I asked my father-in-law if he remembered Gacy. His initial reply was no, not specifically. But he did remember a very odd, greasy American man who was attached to the band and seemed to always be on right on their heels. That's not all he wanted to be on I'd reckon. I lent him the copy of MOJO. After reading the article it all came back to him and he confirmed the whole story. Crazy stuff, I thought him just meeting the Kinks was amazing by itself!
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