[music] DONOVAN - Troubadour 1964-1976 (Epic)

[dot_fennel]

The few songs they had on in Amoeba Records ("Mellow Yellow", "Epistle To Dippy", "There Is A Mountain") and the entrancing, almost sordidly-childlike photos of Donovan on the covers of his 60s albums made me think the guy had more to him than his fluffy reputation suggested. I imagined a songwriter who'd unlocked weird parts of the id with psychedelic drugs and yet for whatever reason called every last part of it 'beauty', and moreover put it all into peaceful, subtly threatening songs.

Well, yeah, nice thought, but listening to this retrospective I guess I just made it up from whole cloth. "There Is A Mountain" still makes me feel like something is sneaking up on me, though.

Comments

[bluepapercup]

*stifles a laugh*

Donovan is kinda weird. And my mom likes him. Which, given that her choices of music are about a 50-50 split of good and horrible means that you did just about as well as could be expected with this purchase.

my condolences.

[cabell.livejournal.com]

My parents got me Donovan's greatest hits for Christmas in high school because I loved "Season of the Witch" so much--it's still pretty much the only Donovan song I listen to with any regularity.