driven by Ray's 1965 Fender Malibu acoustic guitar, while Dave often supplemented an electric guitar contribution on Ray's 1963 Fender Telecaster or with one of his own guitars, such as his 1959 Gibson Flying V or Guild Starfire III. Dave's typical Vox AC30 amplifier was likely used for most tracks, though the long sustain heard on "Wicked Annabella" suggests the use of an early-era solid-state amplifier. Four microphones were placed around Avory's drum kit and Pete Quaife's Rickenbacker bass was plugged directly into the mixing desk. Avory altered his drum sound on "Wicked Annabella" and "Picture Book" by disengaging the snare and deadened the sound on "Phenomenal Cat" by placing newspaper over a floor tom. Among the songs on Village Green with real string sections are "Village Green" and possibly "Animal Farm", as arranged by English composer David Whitaker. String and brass sections are generally absent from the Kinks' late 1960s recordings, likely because Pye executives saw the hiring of an arranger and session players as too expensive to warrant; the album prominently employs a Mellotron as an inexpensive alternative. A predecessor to the synthesiser, the Mellotron is a keyboard instrument on which the keys trigger tape loops of recordings of a variety of instruments, enabling its user to play keyboard parts using those voices. Ray was introduced to the instrument in May1967 while visiting the home of Graham Nash, a member of the contemporary English rock band the Hollies. He purchased his own soon after and likely first employed it in early June1967 on the Kinks' song "Lazy Old Sun". The sounds it mimics on Village Green include a horn section ("Do You Remember Walter"), accordion ("Sitting by the Riverside") and flute ("Phenomenal Cat"), among others. Session musician Nicky Hopkins contributed extensive keyboard work for the album on piano, harpsichord and Mellotron. Hopkins had first contributed to a Kinks LP in 1965 on The Kink Kontroversy and his playing featured heavily on the band's releases to 1968. He later estimated he played "about seventy per cent" of the LP's keyboard work, while Ray played the rest, though the album's liner notes credit all of the keyboard playing to Ray. Ray sings lead on each song except "Wicked Annabella", where Dave sings lead. Ray's vocal is generally double tracked throughout. The group sang harmony vocals together, often supplemented by a falsetto from Ray's wife Rasa Davies, who had sung backing