Mellow Yellow Mellow Yellow "Mellow Yellow" is a song written and recorded by Scottish singer-songwriter Donovan. In the US it reached No. 2 on the "Billboard" Hot 100 in 1966, (Both Good Vibrations by The Beach Boys and Winchester Cathedral by The New Vaudeville Band kept it from hitting No. 1). Outside the US, "Mellow Yellow" peaked at No. 8 in the UK in early 1967. 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. According to Donovan's notes, accompanying
Yellow (Coldplay song) that "they would never make it". The song was later performed on 7 July at the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany with guest vocals from Shakira. "Yellow" has been covered by numerous singers worldwide, some in different languages and styles. A Chinese language version of "Yellow" was recorded by Chinese rock singer Zheng Jun in 2001, six months after the original release of the single. Singaporean singer Tanya Chua covered the song. The cover band and comedy act Richard Cheese and Lounge Against the Machine covered this as a Lounge style version on his 2004 album "I'd Like a Virgin".