Mr. Cobain writes...
Always a pleasure indeed (!) to hear from the Sunshine Superman himself, 'Donovan'... so last week when the Amorphous were invited to the Hampstead premiere of a new film celebrating the life and career of said psychedelic minstrel of course we duly attended... we were regaled with over 2 hrs of stories charting this man's amazing journey. Initially hailed as 'the British Dylan', Donovan justifiably carved out his own VERY special place in the musical lexicon (and rightly so!)... with his own unique brand of zen beat psych jazz funk bohemia and that's before you get onto mystical rockfolk and excursions into eastern promise! This man's music is as vast as the cosmos he is clearly tuned to! From the Maharishi to teaching John Lennon the Dear Prudence finger picking guitar style to drug busts and forays into transcendental states to American No1s to Led Zep being his backing band its quite a story! We didn't want to ask if we were in it (cos we vaguely remember a camera ghosting around when we worked together) so we were pleasantly surprised and honored when our faces duly popped out at us from the silver screen...
So here's a snippet where we hang with THE MaaaaaaN himself and work on a new rendition of a track that had previously appeared on the Isness called 'Divinity'!!
After the film Don's wife hugged Gaz and thanked him for the burdock root he had thrust into Don's hand as he climbed into a black cab leaving the Galaxial Pharmaceutical (our studio of the time). Don had looked bemused at the sight of the muddy root vegetable in his hand and so Gaz had said '"your wife will know what to do with it!". Well it seems she did... as she told him last week she dried it and put it on the altar and has been munching a small amount DAILY ever since and as you'll see she looks wonderful... (Now could that be the burdock root we wonder ha ha!)
Incidentally we have licensed a couple of Donovan trax for the upcoming 'A Monstrous Psychedelic Bubble Exploding In Your Mind Vol 1- Cosmic Space Music' album which is a DJ journey that we have compiled and mixed that will be released on Nov 24th on Platipus Records. This has taken well over a year to bring together... such is the complexity (and insanity) and (did anyone mention) bureauocracy of licensing departments and record companies.
Anyway TIS DONE and tis sounding grande and charts over 40 years of psychedelic cosmic space music and IN THE PROCESS reclaims the psychedelic word from the annuls of history and the lingo of marketing men to return it to its original and grander original transformative origins to show how the spirit is truly vibrant and alive NOW NOW!! HOW could it not be with the triple helix in development an all!!
From Mahavishnu Orchestra to Miles Davis to Can to Devendra Banhart to Lord Sitar to the maaAN Donovan to Amorphous and too many others to mention (over 40 tracks) tis truly a sonic feast!! We are currently in talks to host events on the Monstrous Bubble theme so keep it locked in an incredibly loose way!!
Multidimensional love
the Automobile Association
