Donovan - Open Road (1970)

One of Donovan's best and his last really great album, closing out the 60s and transitioning into the 1970s with a bang. (Cosmic Wheels had a lot of good songs, and Seven-tease wasn't bad, but neither as good as this or his 1960s releases). In the seventies, a lot of bands were getting overly political, and that is starting to influence a couple of songs on this 1970-released album, such as "Riki-Tiki-Tavi" and "Poke at the Pope." But if you ignore the spoken words & meaning but think of it as a song about a mongoose, its really a great song with great chorus and hooks. There are so many great songs otherwise. I particularly like the darker sounding songs such as Curry Land, Roots of Oak and Celtic Rock, which I have heard was the first to legitimately use that genre label.

But the rest of the songs are awesome and filled with memorable choruses and licks. I won't go through all the others, but for anyone who is a true Donovan (1960s/1970s) fan, this should be in your collection.

I bought this when it was first released, but I was living outside of the continental U.S. at the time, and as Donovan had recently started losing some popularity, none of the normal vinyl LP stores sold this. So I ended up buying a 1/4" reel-to-reel tape from a store that sold tape recorders and other electronic equipment. Over the years, the tape machines left and I had no way of playing it. (I did not think to transfer it to Cassette, but Cassettes decks weren't all that good anyway back then) I recently got back into listen to other Donovan albums I had repurchased on CD, and it reminded me to pick this one up as well. Awesome album from one of the true superstars of the 1960s. He rode next to the Beatles, the Stones, the Who and other powerful forces of British Rock at the time, and deserves the highest praise.