10. DonovanSunshine Superman

I don’t how this record came to me but I was in high school. I remember hearing ‘Jennifer Juniper’ and ‘Mellow Yellow’ which were huge hits on the radio in the States and they were kind of cute and twee but then I got hold of the Sunshine Superman album and it made me so happy. It was the happiest record that I’d ever heard and I loved it! I’d put it on every day and listen to it on the way to school and I loved everything about it.

I found out a little bit about Donovan and that he was a pop star poet in England. Not really heavyweight but a little bit folky. I’d see these pictures of him with his curly hair and I just loved him.

At the tail end of The Adult Net, I decided to do a version of ‘Hurdy Gurdy Man’ with Nigel Kennedy playing electric violin, and also Stephen Duffy, and John Leckie produced it. We sent it to Donovan when it was done and he got to me and said, ‘this is my favourite cover of that song that anyone’s ever done’ and I was like, ‘oh my God!’ And he was like, ‘would you like to have dinner?’ and I was like, ‘OH. MY. GOD!’ And so we all went to dinner with him and his wife, Linda. I was really nervous but we all ended being friends. They were like my rock & roll parents and Nigel and I went on holiday with them and we became really close.

He told me all the stories about Rishikesh with The Beatles and he was a great talker and a lovely man.