Are you going to San Francisco? You'd better watch out for Peacers

This aesthetic of more pop orientated tracks with a short, sharp acoustic back bone is something Donovan has carried with him and is something that provides the overarching basis of his eponymous album, released under the new moniker Peacers.

As an album, Peacers has an ace up it’s sleeve. The fact that current Bay Area psych-rock poster boy Ty Segall provides not only production duties, but also arranged and played nearly the entire rhythm section for the album, undoubtedly plays to every strength Donovan has as Peacers.

After the wonderfully ramshackle opener “At The Milkshake Hop”, that comes across like something Adam Green would have produced during the height of his late 90s demo tape period, “R.J.D. (Salem)” swirls into view. The track works as a de facto greeting to Peacers' weird world as Donovan repeats “As-salamu alaykum” over a bracing acoustic riff, the whole thing liberally dipped in pools of reverb.

The spooky “Institution Shave” judders with an itchy guitar line that jumps like a strung-out Creedence Clearwater Revival, but the real psych-rock blasts are saved for the likes of “Laze It” and “Piccolo and Ant”. These tracks stride with the type of technicolour energy that makes you want to reach for the nearest tie-dye shirt and start throwing some serious shapes.

But for all the loose energy Donovan is certainly capable of providing, things get a little off-kilter as the album approaches its conclusion. “Clay Centre KS” meanders along with a riff and vocal delivery so chilled out it’s practically frozen to the spot, and “Drama Ensues” sees Donovan give way to his inner experimentalist to such and extent that the track practically falls in on itself.

It seems like, for now, Peacers is a vehicle for Donovan to indulge in some trial and error, and this album feels like the perfect playground for him to do so. Not everything on Peacers works, but when it does, it’s the sonic equivalent of driving along a beach with a summer breeze rushing right through you.