So it’s about being cool, laid-back, and also the electrical bananas that were appearing on the scene – which were ladies vibrators. ‘They call me Mellow Yellow, I’m the guy who can calm you down.’ Lennon and I used to look in the back of newspapers and pull out funny things and they’d end up in songs. His voice is likely somewhere in the mix at the end of the song amid the revelry.ĭonovan had recently helped out McCartney on another “Yellow” song: He provided the “sky of blue, sea of green” line in “ Yellow Submarine.” Both songs hit #2 US in 1966. McCartney dropped by the session and was captured on tape saying “Mellow Yellow” and doing some cheering. He was rumored to be the whispering voice saying “quite rightly,” but that was Donovan. Paul McCartney appears somewhere on this track, but it’s not clear where. Donovan had a small part in coming up with the lyrics for “ Yellow Submarine“, and McCartney played bass guitar (uncredited) on portions of Donovan’s Mellow Yellow album. Paul McCartney can be heard as one of the background revellers on this track, but the “quite rightly” whispering answering lines in the chorus is not McCartney but rather Donovan himself. This definition was re-affirmed in an interview with NME magazine: “it’s about being cool, laid-back, and also the electrical bananas that were appearing on the scene – which were ladies’ vibrators.” According to The Rolling Stone Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock and Roll, he admitted later the song made reference to a vibrator an “electrical banana” as mentioned in the lyrics. According to Donovan’s notes, accompanying the album Donovan’s Greatest Hits, the rumour that one could get high from smoking dried banana skins was started by Country Joe McDonald in 1966, and Donovan heard the rumour three weeks before “Mellow Yellow” was released as a single. The song was rumoured to be about smoking dried banana skins, which was believed to be a hallucinogenic drug in the 1960s, though this aspect of bananas has since been debunked. 1.) Outside the US, “Mellow Yellow” peaked at No. (Both Good Vibrations by The Beach Boys and Winchester Cathedral by The New Vaudeville Band kept it from hitting No. A little-known cool cover version of "Mellow Yellow" was done by the jazz-soul combo Young Holt Unlimited.“ Mellow Yellow” is a song written and recorded by Scottish singer-songwriter Donovan. The famous lyrical reference to an electric banana gave rise to fantastic rumors that smoking banana peels would get you high, though the words were surely intended in a lighthearted humorous fashion, not as a serious revelation. That partying atmosphere, something like a bridge between the Beatles' "Yellow Submarine" and "All You Need Is Love" ambience, sticks with the rest of the song, particularly the fadeout. (Though those whispers have sometimes been rumored to have been voiced by Donovan's friend Paul McCartney, actually these were by Donovan.) After a near drum-roll of a turnaround, the song glides into an instrumental break of celebratory partying, with voices whooping it up as a striptease-like brass section takes over the main riff. It was certainly difficult not to sing along with that chorus, too, particularly as it was immediately rejoined by a responsive knowing, nudge-nudge affirmative whisper.
Only in 19, perhaps, would that nickname be worn as a badge of honor, but it fit in well with the psychedelic era, when the more outrageous the language and flouting of convention, the better. What makes this a psychedelic folk-rocker, rather than a sassy jazz tune, is the insistent chorus in which Donovan gleefully announces that they call him Mellow Yellow.
The verses are certainly mighty melodic in a pop folk-rock fashion, with the singer's sly declarations of love for various fantastic women accompanied by only minimal electric guitar and bass. The big hook in "Mellow Yellow" is not a riff or note, but a jazzy walking beat which carries the instrumental intro until Donovan's usual breathy vocal makes its entrance. Countercultural bliss, of course, did not prohibit commercial success, and "Mellow Yellow" was a very big hit, reaching number two in the U.S. "Mellow Yellow," in tandem with its predecessor "Sunshine Superman," established Donovan as the ultimate bearer of good vibes at the dawn of the psychedelic era.
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