The Beatles and The Rolling Stones were the two defining bands of the 1960s . Surely, any artist who split the difference between them would find an audience. A
Singer who saw himself as the middle ground between the two bands was big in the 1960s — but only in the 1960s. A fellow
British Invasion artist compared his
music to The Beatles’ and The Rolling Stones’ Donovan is a folk singer who became one of the icons of the British Invasion. He’s known for hits such as “Hurdy Gurdy Man” and “Mellow Yellow,” as well as the popular album track “Season of the Witch.” Notably, Donovan’s album Sunshine Superman became one of the foundational texts of the psychedelic rock subgenre . During a 2018 interview with Goldmine , Donovan explained his musical style. “Once you’ve romanced your darling with The Beatles, once you’ve rocked and rolled with The Rolling Stones, later in the evening you’d put on a Donovan record to enter yet another place between the love songs and hot rock,” he said. “I had been doing all this quite naturally not really thinking too much about it. It’s only in later years did I realize a lot of this.” While two of Donovan’s big hits are love songs — “Sunshine Superman” and “Atlantis” — he also released “hot rock” songs like “Goo Goo Barabajagal (Love Is Hot),” a collaboration with the Jeff Beck Group, and his Alice Cooper duet “Billion Dollar Babies.” Donovan explained the defining sound of the 1960s Notably, Donovan went psychedelic in 1966, the year before The Beatles released Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and The Rolling Stones released Their Satanic Majesties Request . A reporter asked the “Catch the Wind” singer to define psychedelia. “Psychedelia is not only a few lyrics about getting high, although that’s part of it,” he opined. “It’s a mood. “You probably know much younger new psychedelic bands today who would much rather play a song on stage for over 20 minutes with no words,” he added. “It’s not that they’re high onstage. It’s very hard to perform music when you’re high. Very few bands took acid and then went onstage. It’s almost impossible. The idea for a psychedelic sound is a chill sound, a sound having a distinct effect upon the central nervous system.” What made Donovan different from The Beatles and The Rolling Stones One main difference between The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and Donovan is their career paths. The Beatles infamously broke up in 1970 and each member of the group managed to have a string of solo hits during the 1970s. On the other hand, The Rolling Stones have stayed together to this day and continued their run of hits into the 1990s, making them one of the most enduring bands in the history of rock ‘n’ roll . Meanwhile, things went differently for Donovan. He hit on a sound that was so quintessentially 1960s that he didn’t manage to find any major success afterward. “Billion Dollar Babies” is the only tune he released after the 1960s that garnered any real attention and didn’t reach the top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100 . After that, Donovan made some interesting choices, such as collaborating with legendary hip-hop producer Rick Rubin on the record Sutras , but his time as a pop star was over. Regardless of where life took them, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and Donovan always knew how to make interesting music.