Pete Quaife | Kinks bassist, 66

Pete Quaife, 66, a bassist who joined forces with two schoolmates to form the Kinks, one of the leading rock bands of the 1960s British Invasion, died Wednesday of kidney failure in Herlev, Denmark.

Born Peter Alexander Greenlaw Quaife, he went to William Grimshaw Secondary Modern School in North London with Ray and Dave Davies, and the three began playing music together in 1961, with a succession of drummers. Ray was the front man, and Dave played lead guitar. They went through several names, including the Ravens, before settling on the Kinks in early 1964, with Mick Avory on drums. After two failed singles, the band struck gold that August with "You Really Got Me."

The song reached No. 1 in Britain and No. 7 in the United States, catapulting the young band to the fore of the British scene, and the abrasive guitar distortion on "You Really Got Me" and its follow-up, "All Day and All of the Night," helped start a thousand garage bands. The Kinks were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990.

The band continued to score British hits throughout the 1960s, yet had only sporadic success in the United States, where a four-year dispute with the American Federation of Musicians prevented it from touring for most of the late 1960s.

Mr. Quaife left the band for part of 1966 when he was injured in a car accident, but by 1969, he quit for good. He was replaced by John Dalton.

After leaving the Kinks, Mr. Quaife played briefly with another band, Mapleoak, and worked as a graphic artist in Denmark and Canada. He was found to have renal failure in 1998, and documented his experiences in cartoons collected in two volumes of books titled The Lighter Side of Dialysis. - N.Y. Times News Service