Sixties legends The Kinks have been the subject of reunion rumours for years, and it appears that there's still a chance that Ray and Dave Davies, who haven't performed onstage together for more than a decade, may reunite the band.
The brothers talk about the current state of their famously fractious relationship in a new interview with The Times, undertaken to mark the opening of The Kinks: Brothers, an exhibition in London that finds the pair collaborating with English painter Christian Furr, best known in musical circles for his paintings of the Rolling Stones, Marianne Faithfull, Kate Bush and Jimi Hendrix.
"It’s miraculous, really, how we've become so bonded," Dave says, before revealing that the project with Furr has helped to thaw any remaining ice. “We were getting on great. We have fluctuated between getting on really well and not getting on at all over the years, but there’s always been telepathy, since childhood.”
Asked if a Kinks reunion is still possible, he says, “I don’t know, but never say never."
In late 2023, Ray Davies revealed that he was sitting on a large stash of unfinished new songs by The Kinks, and that both brother Dave and drummer Mick Avory had contributed to the recordings.
"There are about two or three songs I want to finish," he said. "And when they’re finished, I’ll put the whole thing together."
Speculation about a possible return to action from The Kinks grew after Ray joined his brother onstage for the first time since 1996 at a show at London's Islington Assembly Hall in late 2015, when the pair performed the classic You Really Got Me together.
The Kinks: Brothers opens today at the Gibson Garage in London and runs until September 6. The collection is based on a passport booth photograph of the brothers taken in East Finchley, North London, in 1968.
