Sealed LP: Donovan: 7-Tease

$

20

Donovan: 7-Tease

FACTORY SEALED LP

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Songs

• Rock and Roll Souljer
• Your Broken Heart
• Salvation Stomp
• The Ordinary Family
• Ride-A-Mile
• Sadness
• Moon Rok
• Love of My Life
• The Voice of Protest
• How Silly
• The Great Song of the Sky
• The Quest

Credits

• Charles Rose: Horn
• Harvey Thompson: Horn
• Byron Warner: Vocals
• Florence Warner: Vocals
• David Briggs: Keyboards
• Lea Jane Berinati: Vocals
• Harrison Calloway: Horn
• Ben Cauley: Horn
• Johnny Christopher: Guitar
• Ronnie Eades: Horn
• Ginger Holladay: Vocals
• Mary Holladay: Vocals
• Buffy Sainte-Marie: Vocals
• Donovan: Guitar, Harmonica, Main Performer, Vocals

Album Review

• 7-Tease might be considered the opening of what one could call Donovan's years in the wilderness. His next to last album, Cosmic Wheels, had managed to generate sales but its successor, Essence to Essence, marked the tipping point beyond which, because of the seeming datedness of his image, or whatever reason, he was no longer regarded by the public as being terribly important or relevant, or his records programmed by radio stations or ordered by record retailers in quantities resembling his earlier work. All of this is a pity because a fair hearing of 7-Tease reveals an album steeped in disillusionment, yet built upon beautiful melodies and some of the most diverse and appealing sounds and arrangements of his career, and a harder rocking sound than he was usually known for (courtesy of Nashville-based producer Norbert Putnam, who'd done something similar for Joan Baez). Listening to it 3 years after the fact is an eerie experience, vividly evoking the feelings of uncertainty surrounding the period in which it was made (and for those too young to know, the early to mid-'70s saw the self-destruction and resignation of a U.S. president, crippling oil boycotts affecting daily life in America, and serious political and social strife on every continent except Antarctica) -- all wrapped up in songs that were achingly beautiful, piercing in their directness, and generally as clever as any music of its era. "Rock and Roll Souljer" is a rousing opener (and a could've/should've-been single) whose spelling is a perfectly valid hint of its direction -- it comes with a soul chorus, a bracing, all-too-brief sax solo, and a mix of acoustic and electric guitars that's pretty much a harbinger of the whole album, and it almost deliberately gives a nod to "Universal Soldier" from the opening of Donovan's career. The rest of the album crosses boundaries between folk-based balladry ("Your Broken Heart," "Ride-a-Mile"), Dixieland jazz ("Salvation Stomp"), personal confessional ("The Ordinary Family"), folk-pop ("Sadness"), hard electric rock ("Moon Rok"), political commentary intermingled with breezy-'50s jazz-pop ("How Silly"), serious acoustic folk ("The Great Song of the Sky"), topical songwriting ("The Quest"), and some bittersweet reminiscences ("The Voice of Protest"). For all of its lack of success, Donovan later said that he went into 7-Tease the way he approached every album he ever cut, including such unabashed hits as Sunshine Superman and Hurdy Gurdy Man, and he saw no difference in his way of making music or the quality of what he delivered -- and it turns out that he was 100-percent correct; 7-Tease is about as good as any long-play record he ever made, and as fine an album that can be heard from any '60s artist working in the '70s (and that would include John Lennon, George Harrison, Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez et al). ~ Bruce Eder, All Music Guide

Biography

Donovan biography by Jason Ankeny, All Music Guide

• Upon his emergence during the mid-'60s, Donovan was anointed "Britain's answer to Bob Dylan," a facile but largely unfounded comparison which compromised the Scottish folk-pop troubadour's own unique vision. Where the thrust of Dylan's music remains its bleak introspection and bitter realism, Donovan fully embraced the wide-eyed optimism of the flower power movement, his ethereal, ornate songs radiating a mystical beauty and childlike wonder; for better or worse, his recordings remain quintessential artifacts of the psychedelic era, capturing the peace and love idealism of their time to perfection. Donovan Leitch was born May 10, 1946 in Glasgow and raised outside of London; at 18 he recorded his first demo, and in 1965 was tapped as a regular on the television pop showcase Ready, Steady, Go! He soon issued his debut single "Catch the Wind," earning the first round of Dylan comparisons with his ramshackle folk sound and ragamuffin look; the single nevertheless reached the U.K. Top Five, with a subsequent meeting between the two singer/songwriters captured in the classic D.A. Pennebaker documentary Don't Look Back.
• Donovan's follow-up single, "Colours," was also a hit, and after making his American debut at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival, he issued Fairytale, his second and last LP for the Hickory label. Signing with Epic in 1966, he released his breakthrough album, Sunshine Superman, which in its exotic arrangements and pointedly psychedelic lyrical outlook heralded a major shift from his previous work; the title track topped the charts on both sides of the Atlantic, with the enigmatic "Mellow Yellow" reaching the number two spot a few months later. Donovan remained a chart fixture throughout 1967, generating a series of hits including "Epistle to Dippy," "There Is a Mountain," and "Wear Your Love Like Heaven"; that year he traveled to India alongside the Beatles to study with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, a journey which inspired him to renounce drug use and encourage his listeners to turn to meditation. The ambitious double album A Gift from a Flower to a Garden followed, and in 1968 Donovan resurfaced with The Hurdy Gurdy Man, scoring a Top Five smash with the hallucinatory title cut; the record also yielded the hit "Jennifer Juniper."
• Barabajagal from 1969 generated Donovan's final Top 40 hit, "Atlantis"; for the title track, he collaborated with the Jeff Beck Group, with whom he also worked on 1970s Open Road. He then retreated to Ireland, emerging from a period of seclusion by starring in and scoring the 1972 film The Pied Piper; a pair of new LPs, Cosmic Wheels and Essence to Essence, appeared the following year to disappointing reviews and little commercial interest. Following 1974's 7-Tease, he spent the next years living quietly in California's Joshua Tree desert, mounting only a small club tour to promote 1976's Slow Down; a self-titled LP appeared a year later, and in the wake of 1983's Jerry Wexler-produced Lady of the Stars, he essentially retired from writing and recording altogether. The Donovan revival began in earnest in 1991 when Happy Mondays titled a song in his honor for their groundbreaking Pills 'n' Thrills & Bellyaches; he later toured with the group as well. Five years later, Donovan released his comeback LP, Sutras, helmed by producer du jour Rick Rubin. (The album had the misfortune to be released after Rubin's landmark Johnny Cash record, American Recordings and was virtually ignored or misunderstood by critics.) Donovan toured briefly to support Sutras and then went missing once again, playing out only sporadically. In 2004, however, he reappeared with the intimate and stylish Beat Cafe, a collection of nearly all-original songs produced by keyboardist John Chelew. Donovan also enlisted bassist Danny Thompson and drummer Jim Keltner to round out his quartet. The album featured a pair of covers, a spoken word rendition of poet Dylan Thomas' "Do Not Go Gentle," and a startling rendition of the traditional tune "The Cuckoo."

• This record came from a record store called "Phantasmagoria" which was located in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Phantasmagoria went out of business in 1978. I purchased most of their unsold inventory some years later when I owned "Music Madness" - a new & used record store in Catasauqua.
• Phantasmagoria used round colored stickers to indicate the price of the albums. They had a sign on the wall with the color sticker combinations for the customers to use so they knew the price of the albums. Most of the albums still have these stickers on them, and in some rare cases, the stickers are written on. Some of the records have prices on them. This is the price you would have paid for the record in 1978 if you would have bought it at Phantasmagoria. Please don't confuse these prices with their current value.
• All sealed albums are being sold as collector's items and cannot be returned due to manufacturer's defects. It may be almost impossible to replace many of the sealed albums that I am selling.

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• All album reviews, credits and artist biographies are from All Music Guide. If you haven't been to their web site, you have to check it out. It's one of the most comprehensive music references on the internet. In some cases, credits may include reissue (CD) information. Obviously any credits referenced to CDs do not apply to this album release.

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