After discovering that his Rock and Roll Hall of Fame trophy was listed on eBay, Dave Davies tells Rolling Stone that he’s working with the seller to get it back. “I’m sure it’s going to be resolved now,” he says on a phone call Friday. “I feel confident.” The seller, who purchased the trophy in good faith for a large amount of money at another auction, is open to a trade, so Davies is considering what he would swap. “I’m not sure what yet, maybe a guitar,” he says.
The statuette, which Davies received when the Kinks were inducted in 1990, had been listed for $12,500. “Award has a few scratches and a small repair to the left arm,” the description said. The listing, viewable on TMZ, said shipping would cost only $29.
“I was shocked,” Davies says of seeing the listing. “I didn’t know you could buy other people’s awards. If people have an award, you can just sell it?”
On Thursday, he had written on social media that the sale had been without his consent. “I don’t want to have to pay 12 grand to get my own award back,” he wrote. “But maybe we can work something out more reasonable.”
Davies isn’t entirely sure how he lost the award. He shot down rumors that he let the payment on a storage space lapse and that the award had been acquired Storage Wars–style. “To be honest, I’ve been on the move, and I had that awful stroke that set me back a few years [in 2004] and a change in residence where I was living,” he says. “Until I heard this, I didn’t know where it was. I didn’t even think about where it was.”
A phone call with the eBay merchant, Colony Records, went well. The seller said they purchased the trophy in the early 2000s from another auction house and that it had changed hands before then, too. Colony said they attempted to reach the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame before buying it to make sure it had not been reported stolen, which it hadn’t been. During that time, nobody reached out to Davies about it. “I didn’t know what happened to it at all,” Davies says. “It might have been an innocent situation.”
Davies has a trip to the U.K. planned for the next month and hopes to work everything out when he returns.
As for the Rock Hall induction itself, Davies recalls the event as special. “It was in New York at the Waldorf Astoria,” he says. “We had a great time. I loved it. It’s nice to get awards after all these years of touring and hard work. It’s nice to be appreciated.”
Davies hopes to reunite with Ray soon to record some new music as the Kinks. “There’s so much material that can be resurrected or remixed,” he says. “I know that Ray has been working on a few things. There have been Atmos links and a few things. So there’s more to come. But I don’t know about performing or anything yet.” Asked if he could confirm they had something in the works, Davies says, “Yeah, yeah, of course.”
So where will Davies keep the trophy when it’s back in his hands? “Out of harm’s way,” he deadpans.
From Rolling Stone US
