The album is named after the Muswell Hill area of North London, where band leader Ray Davies and guitarist Dave Davies grew up and the band formed in the early 1960s.

The title is also said to be a humoerous reference to The Bevely Hilbillies, a popular tv show a that time.

In the title song Ray Davies sings with a kind of American country music accent, and references the rural American Appalachian region in the lyrics "'cause I'm a Muswell Hillbilly Boy / But my heart lies in old West Virginia."

The front cover picture was taken by Rod Shone in the Archway Tavern, a pub in Archway (about two miles away from Muswell Hill). - Wikipedia

Among its 12 songs were "20th Century Man," "Acute Schizophrenia Paranoia Blues," "Have a Cuppa Tea,." and "Muswell Hillbilly."

This is the interior gatefold of the album, opened up. (click to enlarge)

This (below) photo is in the top left corner of the gatefold on many issues of the album.

This is a picture of the Archway Tavern in Archway, London. It is the pub in which the album cover photo was taken. It is located on Archway Hill near the Archway tube station. It was built in 1888, making it 135 years old.

To see the location in Google Street Views, click here.

I visited it during a one day layover in London while on my way to Italy.

This is a picture of the building taken in 1913 located inside the pub.

Inside the pub they have a copy of the album displayed under glass on the wall.

If you stand next to the album cover you can look out and see right where the album cover was taken.

Here's the PopSpot.

And if you take out the background, of the album here's what you would get.

Be sure to say hi to my friendlly Anchor Tavern tour guide Paul McGill when you go.

The interior shot was taken on the corner of Retcar Place and Dartmouth Park Hill (road) in Highgate. All the buildings in the picture have been subsequently demolished and replaced by modern housing, but the street corner is still there. Retcar Place was known as Retcar Street at the time of the album.

The store, called Cats on Holiday was likely a pet store where people could drop their pets off while they went on holiday.

The location is an 8-minute walk from the Anchor Inn.

You can see the sign for the old name, Retcar Street, in the center of the photo.

Here's what the store used to look iike before the construction barrier wall was put up.

And a view from further back.

Here's the old photo with the album, for comparison.

And here's the PopSpot of the interior gatefold photo.

Here it is with just the band. Square version.

And with just the band. Rectangular version..

This is the same scene today - the corner of Retcar Place and Dartmouth Park Hill (road).

This is the photo that can be found on the upper left corner of the inner sleeve of some of the albums. It was taken in the same photo session as the other two.

This is the building they are in front of which is located at 60 Southwood Lane, Highgate, near the corner of Kingsley Place.

They are standing on a traffic island in the middle of the street, but I think the island in the picture has been moved to the right since their picture was taken.

This location is about a 20 minute walk (.8 miles) from the last location on Retcar Place.

Here's a PopSpot of the location with a background photo from Bing Street VIews.

And here is what I could do using Google Street View, which also has limited camera angles on this street.

To see this location in Google Street Views, click: here.

This map shows the locations of the three spots on a map of the Archway/Highgate area. According to Google, it's an 8-minute walk from the Archway Tavern to the site of the "Cats-on-Holiday" picture. (The buildings were demolished and a housing community is there now.)

From the "Cats-on-Holiday" location to the location of the band on a traffic island on Southwood Lane is supposedly a 20-minute walk.

And that's it, folks! Thanks to Marie Fotini and Monte Conner for their research on this PopSpot, and to Hugh Gilmour for some nice Photoshop work. And also thanks to the website: london.kastoffkinks.co.uk for the inside picture locations. They have a lot of other Kinks locations, too. The website is here.