This Donovan Hit May (or May Not) Have Anticipated the Creation of a Legendary Hard Rock Band

It’s one of the spookiest-sounding hit songs in music history. Many filmmakers (David Fincher, we’re looking at you) have used it as an eerily atmospheric needle drop. Yet oddly enough, Donovan’s 1968 smash “Hurdy Gurdy Man” came from a place of extreme positivity.

It’s also notable for who played on it, or, at least, who might have played on it. That mystery is almost as compelling as the song itself.

Getting “Gurdy” with It

Donovan has given plenty of interviews throughout the years, during which he talked at length about the 1968 No. 5 hit single “Hurdy Gurdy Man”. Frankly, the Scottish folk music legend has contradicted himself about everything from the origins of the song to the players who helped bring him to life.

Before we get to all that, let’s frame it in the context of Donovan’s career. By 1968, he had established himself as an artist who could keep his toes dipped in the folk idiom while managing to cross over to the pop charts with impressive regularity. He also ran in fast company. Donovan joined The Beatles on their famous retreat to India in 1968.

It’s probable that Donovan wrote “Hurdy Gurdy Man” during that retreat, although he has also mentioned a trip to Jamaica inspiring the lyrics. George Harrison actually wrote the words for one of the song’s verses, but Donovan had to cut them so the song didn’t run too long. But he was far from the only big name to get involved with this track.

Zep Minus Plant?

Here’s where we have to preface everything by saying we can’t really be sure of anything surrounding the principals involved in the recording of “Hurdy Gurdy Man”. The most oft-told legend is that Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones, and John Bonham all played on the track, therefore giving Page ideas for personnel when he started to put Led Zeppelin together a year later.

However, the only one who is an absolute certainty is Jones, who played bass and arranged the track. Page has been quoted as saying he didn’t play on the song, even though his website claims that he did. Similarly, there are conflicting reports on Bonham’s involvement.

Whoever was involved, they certainly helped Donovan conjure up a beguiling moodiness on the track. The public certainly responded. “Hurdy Gurdy Man” went to the Top 5 on both sides of the Atlantic in 1968.

Behind the Lyrics of “Hurdy Gurdy Man”

Even though Donovan uses the hurdy-gurdy, an antiquated stringed instrument with a crank, as his jumping-off point, he was referring to any musician who brings something special to town with them. The narrator goes on a mystical journey: “To find that I was by the sea/Me gazing with tranquility.”

He suggests a period of uncertainty and unease has enveloped both him and the world around him. “Down through all eternity,” Donovan sings. “The crying of humanity.” But then the chorus arrives with the musical savior: “’Tis then when the Hurdy Gurdy Man/Comes singing songs of love.”

“Hurdy Gurdy Man” represented one of the last gasps of Donovan’s commercial peak. As the 70s dawned, his trippy songcraft didn’t get nearly as much attention. But he certainly commanded it with this song, which can be enjoyed as either a lyrical beacon of light or a musical doorway to darkness.

(Photo by Ivan Keeman/Redferns)