Lots and lots and lots and lots of bands pay lip service to the Kinks, which doesn?t do Ray Davies any good now; where was everybody when his band was banned from touring America at the height of the British Invasion? And ever since then of course Davies became absorbed deeper and deeper in his Britishness, with ever-diminishing returns in an America almost completely unconcerned with afternoon tea and village greens and so on. But some are listening, including Matt Adams of these here Blank Tapes. His Kinks influence shows through over this entire CD, but it doesn?t key off ?You Really Got Me? or even ?This Is Where I Belong? so much as, well, ?Village Green? or ?Afternoon Tea.? Adams is into the icy, deceptively mellow Davies, see the louche ?Clever Disguise,? the droll ?That Bird,? the sprightly ?Somebody New.? This is a totally salutary development and should be encouraged, although it?s not as though Adams has the cooly evil eye Davies did (does). But he has the sonic palette, which he also expands beyond what you?d expect, often putting a banjo way up front in the mix. One thing Adams might need is an editor; this disc is an hour and 20 minutes long, and I?d say there is such a thing as too much of a good thing. The New Pornographers, for example, continue to stun in shorter contexts, leaving you to wonder where the hell they keep pulling their punchy gems from. Adams could produce the same effect (with less punch and more eyebrow-raising wit) if he condensed the work a bit. But overall this is a sweet listen, not (of course) the equal of Face to Face or Arthur, but showing an encouraging willingness to absorb their lessons. 6/10 -- Sal Addays (27 June, 2006)