Jonathan Donahue
American musician
Jonathan Daniel Donahue (born May 6, 1966) is an American rock musician. He is best known as the frontman and a founding member of Mercury Rev, with whom he has released nine studio albums since 1991. He is also a former member of The Flaming Lips and recorded two albums with the group in the early 1990s.
Career
Donahue helped form Mercury Rev, along with vocalist/guitarist David Baker, bassist Dave Fridmann, guitarist and clarinetist Grasshopper (born Sean Mackowiak), rooster-tail bass flutist Suzanne Thorpe, and drummer Jimy Chambers, in the late 1980s as a source to create soundtracks to the members' personal student films. The members were further encouraged to explore their talents by their mentor, minimalist composer and multimedia artist Tony Conrad.
Donahue also doubled as a concert promoter in Buffalo. After billing the Butthole Surfers and their opening act The Flaming Lips, Donahue joined The Flaming Lips around 1989/1990 as their guitar technician. He later joined the band as the full-time lead guitarist and played on the albums In a Priest Driven Ambulance and Hit to Death in the Future Head.
After being a member of The Flaming Lips for approximately two years, Donahue and The Flaming Lips frontman Wayne Coyne began to disagree over creative issues. Donahue left the band shortly after recording Hit to Death in the Future Head and was replaced by Oklahoma City guitarist Ronald Jones.
The public source identifies “Jonathan Donahue” as american musician. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Jonathan, Donahue and American.
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Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 26, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3809917. VIAF identifies the subject as 184149196548374792529. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1966, 1991, 1989 and 1990.
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This entry incorporates text from “Jonathan Donahue” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.