Mellow Yellow

If Sunshine Superman signalled a revolutionary leap forward from the 'folk' style associated with Donovan, Mellow Yellow showed a real flowering of lyrical maturity. Writer In The Sun, Young Girl Blues and Hampstead Incident are wonderful vignettes of life, as are many of the other songs on this wonderful collection. Its a pity really that the single Mellow Yellow was the hit it was, as it tended to blind everyone to the rest of these songs. A great singalong, but nowhere near the lyrical sophistication of much else on this record.
And the great John Cameron provided some terrific arrangements. Listen to the demos collected on the bonus tracks, and then listen to the great jazzy orchestrations...nuff said. This revealed a Jazz sensibility to Donovan which would return at different times throughout his career, right up to the recent Beat Cafe.
This is a great slice of London life in the 1960s, when Donovan looked around and captured what was happening and who was making it happen: great namechecks on some of these songs! This is the swinging London of models, beats, photographers and bohemians, and Don was able to turn this into some real cool and groovy songs. Its appropriate that one of the songs is called The Observation, because that is a terrific description of much of what this record is all about.
The bonus tracks DO make sense. The demos to some of the songs are a fascinating insight into the transition from idea to tune to final arrangement. The bonus tracks also include the breathtaking Epistle To Dippy, one of Donovan's great 'hidden gems', a roller-coaster of a song with an arrangement to die for and lyrics which tumble like a stream of consciousness to form a whirlpool of images and ideas, all held together by musical figures and textures of real originality. Listen to the single version, and then to the 'alternative': whoever made the decision to re-record and re-arrange got it absolutely right!
Like the Sunshine Superman LP, contractual issues kept this record unreleased in the UK for many years; we had to make do with a record which included selections from both and which did justice to neither.
So, from the wasted world-weariness of Writer In The Sun and the delicate Sand And Foam, to the snappy Sunny South Kensington, let Donovan show you a long-forgotten world of hipsters, tripsters and scene-makers. You won't be disappointed, and you just might be enchanted, like those mist covered magic glades of Hampstead Heath.

"Mellow Yellow" was Donovans's second electric album, and his second produced by Micky Most. To call the album electric is probably a little misguiding, as many tracks are almost pure acoustic recordings; but compared to Donovan first two albums these songs are arranged with a great variety of instruments. Though Donovan is covering quite many different styles ( blues, jazz, folk, classical and pop ) the album works very well as a whole; a fact that arranger John Cameron deserves credit for. His arrangements are both tasteful and varied, creating the atmosphere that makes an album.

The list of guest musician features both classical players and well-known studio musicians like John Paul Jones, Harold McNair and Phil Seamen.

The extremely catchy title-track is well-known to everybody who was there in the sixties, and it still has the charm, so no wonder it made it to number one in the charts back then.

Other highlights are the moving "Young Girl Blues", the catchy "Museum" and the complex "Hampstead Incident".

The charming "Sunny South Kensington" works as a reminder of Donovan's first electic hit "Sunshine Superman" and has some amusing Dylan inspired lyrics.

No less than 10 bonus-track, make the CD-reissue quite a scoop. The two single hits "Epistle to Dippy" and "There is a Mountain" would be stand-out on any Donovan album, and here in particular they work extremely well, being recording during some of the same sessions. I always thought that "There is a Mountain" had the same optimistic feel as Traffic's "You Can All Join In"; both quite typical of the hippie way of thinking in the late 1960's.

The demos are mostly Donovan alone with his guitar, before the final arrangements. The swinging jazzy B-side "Preachin` Love" is another gem.

A CD that can only be highly recommended!

I'm a french customer and I must say this album is one of the best that Donovan has ever made ! This re-mastered CD brings a lot of bonus tracks never released before. If you don't know this major poet, buy it without delay (You have the opportunity to hear the mega international hit : Mellow Yellow); For those who already have this stuff, buy it for the bonus (as well as HURDY GURDY MAN - BARABAJAGAL & SUNSHINE SUPERMAN all re-mastered). People, come, from miles around and abroad to hear this music maker : He is simply wonderful !