Jefferson Starship - The Next Generation
| Jefferson Starship | |
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Jefferson Starship in 1976
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| Background information | |
| Origin |
San Francisco, California, United States |
| Genres | Rock, hard rock, psychedelic rock, progressive rock, soft rock |
| Years active | 1974–1984, 1992–present |
| Labels | RCA, Grunt, Epic |
| Associated acts | Jefferson Airplane, Starship, KBC Band, Hot Tuna |
| Website | www |
| Members |
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| Past members | See: List of Jefferson Starship members |
Jefferson Starship is an American rock band from San Francisco, California which evolved out of the group Jefferson Airplane following the departure of bassist Jack Casady and guitarist Jorma Kaukonen. The band has undergone several major changes in personnel and genres through the years while retaining the same Jefferson Starship name. The band name was retired in 1985, but picked up again in the early '90s by a Kantner-led revival of the group.
In 1970, while Jefferson Airplane was on break from touring, singer-guitarist Paul Kantner recorded Blows Against the Empire. This was a concept album featuring an ad hoc group of musicians (centered on Kantner, Grace Slick, Joey Covington, and Jack Casady of Jefferson Airplane; Crosby & Nash; and members of Grateful Dead and Santana) credited on the LP as "Paul Kantner & Jefferson Starship", marking the first use of that name. This agglomeration was informally known as the Planet Earth Rock and Roll Orchestra, a moniker later used on a Kantner album in the early 1980s.
On Blows Against the Empire, Kantner and Slick sang about a group of people escaping Earth in a hijacked starship. In 1971, the album was nominated for the prestigious science fiction prize, the Hugo Award, a rare honor for a musical recording. Kantner and Slick were a couple during this period. Slick was pregnant during the recording of the album. Their daughter, China, was born shortly thereafter.
Kantner and Slick with the Planet Earth Rock and Roll Orchestra released two follow-up albums: Sunfighter, an environmentalism-tinged album released in 1971 to celebrate China's birth, and 1973's Baron von Tollbooth & the Chrome Nun, titled after the nicknames David Crosby had given to the couple. Bassist/keyboardist/vocalist David Freiberg was given equal billing alongside Kantner and Slick on the latter album. A founding member of Quicksilver Messenger Service, Freiberg had known and played with Kantner on the folk circuit in the early 1960s and sang background vocals on Blows Against the Empire. Following a marijuana arrest that resulted in his departure from Quicksilver in 1971, he joined Jefferson Airplane as a vocalist for their 1972 tour, documented on the live Thirty Seconds Over Winterland (1973).
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