The Kinks, "Muswell Hillbillies" (RCA, 1971)

The age of hard rock just might have gotten its start with the pair of guitar chords that open "You Really Got Me," the Kinks' first hit single from the summer of 1964. The brothers Davies - Ray the singer and songwriter, Dave the lead guitarist - set the template for the hyperamplified form of music that has aroused the primodial instincts of listeners for a couple of generations now.

The groundbreaking record also paved the way for a string of hits by the quartet, which got its start in the Muswell Hill section of London. Songs like "All Day and All of the Night," "Tired of Waiting for You" and "Sunny Afternoon" still appear regularly on the playlists of certain radio stations as classics of the mid-'60s.

The last-named tune, with its easygoing rhythm and jazzy chord changes, points the way toward the Kinks' preffered sound in the latter stages of the decade. While many of their fellow rock bands on both sides of the Atlantic were exploring blues, psychedelia and primordial metal, the Kinks took a more introspective approach, reflecting Ray Davies' wistful views of the passing of the England he knew as a youngster. A trio of exceptional albums - "Something Else by the Kinks," "The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society" and "Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire)" - unfold as a series of often-stirring vignettes about the state of Davies' homeland.

Unfortunately, quality doesn't always add up to sales. "Something Else" barely cracked the Top 40 in Britain, and the other two failed to make the charts at all. A handful of singles fared a bit better, but not for American listeners, who pretty much ignored the Kinks until 1970.

That year, the band delivered "Lola vs. Powerman & the Moneygoround, Part One," a harder-edged effort that gives the music business the Ray Davies treatment. The controversial (for the time) single "Lola" cracked the Top 10 in both the U.S. and U.K., and the infectious "Apeman" had chart success as well.

Having successfully recovered a mass audience, the band went into the studio the following year to record a new album for a new label, having switched from Pye in Britain and Reprise over here to RCA in both nations. Executives there probably anticipated another straight-ahead rock effort that would sell as well as its predecessor.

A look at the album's title - a clever play on the Kinks' home neighborhood - shows that wasn't exactly going to be the case.

"Muswell Hillbillies" is what happens when a group of former mods from London turns toward the country for inspiration, and despite the rather absurd premise, it works quite well. Ray Davies assumes almost complete control - producing, arranging and writing the entire album - and the result is a collection of well-constructed songs that don't sound a bit like "You Really Got Me" or "Lola," but stack up quite well to the band's better-known work.

Davies gets things rolling with "20th Century Man," yet another commentary on modern life: "This is the 20th century, but too much aggravation." The song is driven by a propulsive beat that tails off in the middle for a bridge delivers an even bleaker message: "I was born in a welfare state ... controlled by civil servants and people dressed in gray/Got no privacy, got no liberty." Ouch.

The title of the next song, "Acute Schizophrenia Paranoia Blues," is a tip that things won't get much better. But the melody actually is uplifting, and the tongue-in-cheek lyrics or worth some chuckles in their descriptions of trouble hiding around every corner.

The dance hall-flavored "Holiday" is an acoustic-based ode to escaping the evils Davies puts forth in the previous songs, and that's followed by my personal favorite track on the album, "Skin and Bone," a very catchy ditty about how dieting can be too much of a good thing.

"Alcohol" recalls the melancholy themes of some popular melodies of the '30s, with various horns pushing along the sad tale of a "drunken laggard" on skid row. The sing-along chorus of "Complicated Life" might have given the tune a shot as a single in a later era, when the marriage of country and rock wasn't such a novelty.

The masterful songwriting hooks continue with "Here Come the People in Grey," which has a melody somewhat reminiscent of Canned Heat's "Goin' Up the Country," with the message that those people are coming "to take me away."

"Have a Cuppa Tea" is another number full of levity, with Davies bantering about a potion that's a cure for hepatitis, chronic insomnia, chronic insomnia and water on the knee. "Hallelujah, Rosalee!"

American and British folk music merges for "Holloway Jail," with Dave Davies contributing some well-placed slide guitar to yet another tale of woe, this time about a young girl incarcerated for an apparent act of self-defense.

Two quieter songs, the accordion-tinged "Oklahoma USA" and the straight country "Uncle Son," lead up to the near-title-track closer. "Muswell Hillbilly" features a shimmering guitar lick driving a summation of everything Davies has addressed throughout the album: "They're gonna try and make me change my way of living/But they'll never make me something that I'm not."

They didn't make a hit of "Muswell Hillbillies," which peaked at No. 100 in America. But if you know Ray Davies as one of rock's most talented songwriters, give this one a listen and you'll come away impressed, tune after tune.