Jefferson Starship

[C]

Coincidentally I played this earlier today:

The first track from their first album. A very good album

I have the first five albums.

They were a good band - weren't they.....?





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[toomanyhatz]

Good band, yes. I like the first four pretty well (don't count the first one with that name as that was a Kantner solo project and a completely different band). After that, yikes!

I will say I think Balin gets a bad rap in Starship - he didn't lead them in the bad 80s direction. His soul numbers are usually very well done and always well-sung. I think if anything the bad production happened after he left.

[Charlie O.]

I'll pretty much go along with what hatz said, although for me the rot starts setting in as early as Spitfire.

[robertff]

Got a few of their albums Red Octopus, Spitfire, Dragonfly, Freedom At Point Zero, Earth, Gold, and Blows Against The Empire the Kantner solo one. Also got a couple of Starship albums Knee Deep In The Hoopla and No Protection. In truth I didn't know I had so many! Except for the first two all picked up for pennies.

I like the first three mentioned, can't honestly say I remember the others, it's been so long.


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[Lord Rother]

We Built This City is in my Worst 10 (non-novelty) songs ever. No idea which album it’s on but the song itself still gets so much radio play it hurts.

[slightbreeze]

We Built This City is in my Worst 10 (non-novelty) songs ever. No idea which album it’s on but the song itself still gets so much radio play it hurts.

Grace Slick said that "Nothing's gonna stop us now" was terrible, the worst song of the 80's.

[Lord Rother]

We Built This City is in my Worst 10 (non-novelty) songs ever. No idea which album it’s on but the song itself still gets so much radio play it hurts.

Grace Slick said that "Nothing's gonna stop us now" was terrible, the worst song of the 80's.

That is also in my Bottom 10 as it happens! Guess I just haven’t had to turn that one off as recently so it didn’t come to mind.

Other than that I have nothing against the band at all, but those 2 are immediate switch offs for me.

[C]

Freedom At Point Zero

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That's the one I tend to grab first!




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[an (in)elegant chaos]

Freedom At Point Zero

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That's the one I tend to grab first!

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I rather like this band, but only really discovered them a few years later, and they remained a bit of a guilty pleasure. Nice to see some favourable comments on here.
I prefer the first few albums. I haven't played "Freedom At Point Zero" for a while, though I should - the title track came up recently on my mp3 player and I was impressed enough to stop to listen : a lovely rousing, upbeat track (how had this slipped from my memory?)

Favourite tracks from those early LPs? The ones that come quickly to mind are "Caroline", "St Charles", "Ride The Tiger", "Miracles" ('fraid so), and this one from the "Dragonfly" LP:

"Hyperdrive"

[Charlie O.]

"Miracles" ('fraid so)

Nothing to be ashamed of!

[Matt Wilson]

I did an MP3 project here about ten years ago where I took the double-LP Flight Log which consisted of Airplane/Starship/solo stuff from the years '66 - '76. I expanded it so it was more like a CD-R for every LP side - four CD-Rs total. Anyway, I used stuff from every Airplane/Starship related release from those years: Hot Tuna, Kantner/Slick releases, Quah, etc. Roughly two CD-Rs from the '60s, and two from the '70 - '76 years.

Anyway, long story short, one can cherry pick the best material from those '74 - '76 Starship albums, the Hot Tuna LPs, stuff like Blows Against the Empire, etc. and the drop in quality from the '60s stuff isn't that noticeable. Sure, the JA albums in the '60s are superior to the '70s ones, but when you're just choosing songs from that ten year time span, then you see that the writing was fairly consistent during the ten years in question. Had the Airplane never splintered and all the members remained, Airplane albums in the '70s would have been very good indeed.

[an (in)elegant chaos]

"Miracles" ('fraid so)

Nothing to be ashamed of!

Thank you - I think it's an example of a big-selling track that I'm slightly surprised to find that I haven't grown tired of. (Although it wasn't so big-selling in the UK, it still gets a few radio plays...if only of the edited version).

[Walk In My Shadow]

Nope. Don't like them at all.

Wasn't really of fan of the Airplane either.

[C]

Nope. Don't like them at all.

Wasn't really of fan of the Airplane either.

A fair point well made Yves

Yes, a fair point well made





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[slightbreeze]

At least her voice seemed to improve from the Airplane days, when she had all the subtlety of Florence Foghorn

[robertff]

At least her voice seemed to improve from the Airplane days, when she had all the subtlety of Florence Foghorn

Yep


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