The 1964 original. Dave Davies famously slashed the speaker cone of his little amp with a razor blade to get that ragged, buzzing distortion, years before fuzz pedals were common. It's rawer and boxier than the Van Halen cover, with less gain, more mids and a lot of rattle. Standard tuning, two power chords a whole step apart, hammered with downstrokes.
Front of amp: Cheeky Pint (off) → TS Mini (on, the "slashed speaker" buzz) · FX loop: GE-7 (on, boxy mids) → Spark Mini (solo) → HOF (on, light).
A cranked Classic channel, not the Ultra Gain: the sound is a small amp falling apart, not modern distortion. Low Resonance keeps the bottom end thin and boxy like the record.
More drive than usual: stacked on the cranked Classic channel it gives the hairy, slightly broken buzz of Dave's torn speaker. If it gets smooth and singing, it's too much — back the drive off.
Off — the riff needs every downstroke to hit hard.
On for Dave's short, frantic solo so it jumps out over the band.
Off — no delay on a 1964 garage record.
Just a little room — the record sounds like a band in a small studio, not a dry DI.
Lows cut and a big mid hump: that's the small-speaker, early-'60s sound. The 6.4 kHz cut stops the buzz turning into modern fizz.
Pure neck pickup, tone rolled back — a round, '60s thump under the guitar.
Pete Quaife: pick, simple and solid, following the riff's roots. (Mix stays at min — it's the line-in blend, not part of your tone.)
Standard tuning. Two power chords a whole step apart, root on the low E, with the short-long stab rhythm everyone knows. The whole riff steps up a whole step as the song builds, so it's the same shape moved up the neck each time. Downstrokes only, and let it be a bit sloppy — that's the Kinks.
Find guitar lessons on YouTube ↗Opens in a new window — Songsterr blocks embedding in other sites (X-Frame-Options), so it can't be shown inline. Use the Dave Davies guitar track, and check it's the Kinks version, not Van Halen.