Johnny Thunder

"Johnny Thunder" is a song by the English rock band the Kinks from their sixth studio album, The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society (1968). Written and sung by Ray Davies, the song was recorded in March1968. Davies was inspired to write the song after seeing the 1953 film The Wild One, basing it on Marlon Brando's character Johnny as well as on a classmate Davies admired as a child. A rock song, its recording features a countermelody played by Dave Davies on electric guitar, wordless vocal harmonies and one of the album's few instances of a single-tracked vocal by Ray. "Johnny Thunder" is one of several character studies on Village Green. The lyrics describe a motorbike rider who rebels against conformity while surviving on a diet of water and lightning. Ray expressed desires publicly and privately to Pete Townshend that the Who cover the song, and Dave later suggested Townshend incorporated the song's opening riff into his songwriting. Anthony Genzale of New York Dolls used the song's title for his stage name, Johnny Thunders. Background and composition Ray Davies composed "Johnny Thunder" after watching László Benedek's 1953 film The Wild One, which had been banned by British censors until February1968. Described by Dave Davies in an August1968 interview as "the local hound" and "[a] real swine", the song's lead character is a motorbike rider and an enemy of conformity who survives on a diet of water and lightning, seen by author Barry J. Faulk as a clichéd notion of a rebel.