The Kinks’ Dave Davies responds to Moby calling ‘Lola’ transphobic: “Why does he have to have a go at us?”
The Kinks’ guitarist Dave Davies has responded to Moby calling the band’s classic hit ‘Lola’ transphobic.
The spat between Davies and Moby was sparked after the latter gave a new interview to The Guardian over the weekend in which he claimed he could “no longer listen” to the song due to its seemingly outdated lyrics.
“‘Lola’ by The Kinks came up on a Spotify playlist, and I thought the lyrics were gross and transphobic,” Moby said, adding, “I like their early music, but I was really taken aback at how unevolved the lyrics are.”
The musician was referencing lyrics on the 1970 rock classic that say the titular character of Lola “walks like a woman but talks like a man”.
Indeed, Ray Davies claimed that the whole song was inspired by their manager Robert Wace, who once spent a night dancing with a transgender woman.
However, after Moby said that the song’s lyrics were outdated, The Kinks’ guitarist responded with a post on X, in which he began: “I don’t wanna show the guy up, but Moby should be careful what he says.”
Referring to the pioneering San Francisco drag group, Davies continued: “The Cockettes and their friends used to follow us around on tour. We appreciated them.”
He rounded off his post by saying: “Why is Moby being so rude about this simple song? We’re not trans phobic. Why does he have to have a go at us?”
When it was originally released back in 1970, ‘Lola’ attracted controversy for the subject matter which was extremely taboo. Many radio stations would only partly play the song and fade it out before it began referring to aspects of the character’s gender.
Despite initially claiming that the song was based on an experience had by the band’s manager, Ray Davies later told Q in 2016: “The song came out of an experience in a club in Paris. I was dancing with this beautiful blonde, then we went out into the daylight and I saw her stubble. So I drew on that but coloured it in, made it more interesting lyrically.”
Although certain lyrics could be construed as transphobic in a modern context, the songwriter added that the track was written out of “admiration”, noting, “The album, Lola Versus Powerman, is a celebration of artistic freedom (including my own) and the right for anyone to be gender-free if one wishes.”
To this end, the transgender rights activist Mara Keisling previously told NBC how she deeply connected with the song when she first heard it at 11 years old, saying, “It was pretty clear that ‘Lola’ was like me,” before adding, “It made me realise I wasn’t absolutely the only person in the world living with what was then a shameful secret.”
Keisling also noted that the song was powerful to her in understanding her journey as a transgender woman, as she continued: “His song was one of the things that got me through. That sounds odd, but when you’re a kid and that alone, and you have that kind of thing weighing on you, and you can’t talk to anybody about it, a song like ‘Lola’ becomes so important.”
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