A Gift from a Flower to a Garden

I loved John Lennon's song 'Dear Prudence' so much. I wanted to play it so much about a year ago when I was first getting into the Beatles and discovering how brilliant their 'White Album' was.

Through lifes amazing irony, I only learnt how to properly play that song yesterday. This morning, through no conscious relation, I decided to write a review for this album, which I'd been listening to for about three months now. So three, (actually, probably four) months ago, whilst looking up the guitar tab for 'Dear Prudence', I came across a fact, that it was written by Lennon in India after he'd been shown a new technique on his guitar by a guy called Donovan. Who? I looked him up and was intrigued, the kind of intrigue when you are discovering something that is so clearly impressive, weighty, real, and yet was previously totally unknown to you. This man sounded interesting. I knew I had to listen to this mans music now, and so I chose the album with the most appealing title. And a year ago, anything with flower in the title appealed to me.

What a beautiful album it was and is as I listen to it now in Virginia on a large veranda overlooking a forest of impossibly high trees and birds singing eternally. The song 'Sun' plays, and here's what he sings;

"The Earth is turning (round, round!) It's turning round (round, round!) And Love is the Axis (love, love!) And the chop the tree down (timber!)"

It's that last line, and a multitude of others on this album that set it apart from mindless music of the time, the late 60's, when everyone was jumping on the flower-power bandwagon, where stereotypes were born, hippies, peace love etc. He says things that poets say, things that aren't perfectly comprehensible at first, things that you have to think about. I remember hearing a Rolling Stones album a few months before this, 'Their Satanic Majesties Request' and countless other lesser well-known artists that I've come across through my years of vinyl crate-digging, and being less than impressed by what sounds like a very forced psychedelic or flowery sound. There's nothing more uncomfortable than listening to insincere or pretentious music, music that's jumping on a band-wagon.

That's what's so great about this album though. Like all stereotypes, there's truth to them, and this album has references to some things that you'd expect from an artist of the late 60's ("people and flowers are one and the same, all in a chain") , and the first half of the album is very much psychedelic in it's sound. But that's doesn't tell ANY of the story, it doesn't do justice to a single atom of this album. Because it's all just so real, so tinged with reality, with complexities of a human, and with deeper than normal insights that could only come from a sensitive artistic soul. That's who Donovan is.

"Go if you're able, and come if you can, life's very unstable, it's built upon sand."

"Tread so light so not to touch the grass,
Breathe the air so slowly as you pass".

There's happiness to be had on so many of the songs, the kind of melodies that only happy souls can make with their voices, innocent lullaby-type melodies. There's also mystery and curiosity. It's the curiosity of children, and the mystery and fantasies of olde-Britain, olde stories, olde language sometimes (one song has lyrics by William Shakespeare... who usually has good lyrics.) I could try to name a few songs that are highlights, but then, just about every song that's played on my stereo in all the 15 minutes that I've been writing this has been worthy of a mention. Right now it's 'Mandolin man and his secret', and its a perfect example of both the wonderful story-telling (for children and adults alike) style as well as the afforementioned beautiful vocal melodies.

I sometimes worry that my writing (which I think is quite good) for all of these albums I love is going to be misleading. I will often write paragraphs saying how amazing something is, whilst failing to take into account that other people are much more demanding and discriminating and specific... inflexible, when it comes to something that they might consider 'amazing'. After I've gone on about how great it is, I wonder how often they'll listen to it and think "What was he thinking?" A lot of my close friends have expressed something like that to my face when I've made certain film or music recommendations which they didn't quite appreciate in the same way I did. With this album though, I don't think my words have reached too far. I don't think I have put too much of myself in this review, I think this album- A GIFT FROM A FLOWER TO A GARDEN, is exactly as I've described it, and if you have liked the description of it, then I suggest you do yourself a favour and find it, find this friend and make him yours. Donovan is a wonderful man with an open-heart, this record is proof of that.

John Lennon is someone who was open-hearted too, although his open-ness was usually displayed in his depression for quite a long time. He didn't write too many purely 'happy' songs in his time with the Beatles. I think that's why I love 'Dear Prudence' so much. I think some of Donovan must have rubbed off on him that day. And it's a smile in the summer. Peace.

Y.Misdaq aka Yoshi, 03 May 2006