Jefferson Airplane

Starship:. He also expressed views that could be considered sexist. Jefferson Starship:. Though not part of African culture, it should be noted though that Fela was very liberal when it came to sex, as he potrayed in some of his songs, like Open and Close. Jefferson Airplane:. This may have contributed to his ultimate death of complications from AIDS. Record producers who worked with the original band included Greg Edward, Rick Jarrard, Matthew Katz, Ron Nevison, Tommy Oliver and Al Schmitt. The African culture he believed in also included having many wives (polygamy) and the Kalakuta Republic was formed in part as a polygamist colony.

The role of the American Forces Network (AFN) with powerful medium wave radio transmitters situated in West Germany and "pirate radio" ships in the North Sea bringing US hits to the ears of European youth should also be recognised as a force that extended the global reach of West Coast music in the 1964-1972 period. He was also a social commentator, and criticized his fellow Africans (especially the upper class) for betraying traditional African culture. The Beatles have always stressed the influence that the Beach Boys had on their musical development (especially Pet Sounds) but it seems likely that other music from the west coast also spread eastwards and played a key part in making pop music more symphonic and less predictable than it had been before 1965. The era of trans-Atlantic jet travel ushered in a decade earlier and the ability to send TV broadcasts by satellite also facilitated a faster interplay of musical influences across the Atlantic. He was a fierce supporter of human rights, and many of his songs are direct attacks against dictatorships, specifically the militaristic governments of Nigeria in the 1970s and 1980s. British bands apparently influenced by the mellow lyricism of the west coast sound included Barclay James Harvest, David Bowie, Curved Air, Family, Fairport Convention, Jethro Tull, King Crimson, the Moody Blues, the Small Faces, Pentangle and Yes. He was also a supporter of Pan-Africanism and socialism, and called for a united, democratic African republic. Of all these bands, Jefferson Airplane excelled in the psychedelic domain and in their penchant for pretentious track titles, which came to characterise the 1965-75 era. The American Black Power movement influenced Fela's political views.

The original Jefferson Airplane, along with the Byrds, the Doors, the Grateful Dead, the Lovin' Spoonful, the Mamas and the Papas, Tommy James and the Shondells and to some degree Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young will always be associated with the more melodic end of the north American rock spectrum and in due course other groups, such as Steely Dan and the Eagles, continued to blend elements of folk, jazz and rock and bring the results to a global audience. Fela was known for his showmanship, and his concerts were often quite outlandish and wild. Mangano is an expressive and effective singer, and this revived Jefferson Starship can often capture a good deal of the feeling of the original Airplane. Fela refused to perform songs again after he had already recorded them, which also hindered his popularity outside Africa. This latter band plays frequent concerts, and on occasion Jack Casady joins them as well. Fela's main instruments were the saxophone and the keyboards but he also played the trumpet, horn, guitar and made the occasional drum solo. Today, there are two versions of Jefferson Starship — one officially billed as Mickey Thomas' Starship (with Thomas at the forefront), and the revived Jefferson Starship (often called Jefferson Starship: The Next Generation), with Kantner and Balin as leaders, and Diana Mangano replacing Grace Slick as female singer (although Slick did do guest vocals on Jefferson Starship's 1999 album Windows Of Heaven). His songs were mostly sung in Nigerian pidgin English, although he did also perform a few songs in the Yoruba language.

A self-titled album was released by Columbia Records, but the accompanying tour was everything the album wasn't, a success, but their revival too was short-lived, and thus Jefferson Airplane was officially disbanded for good. This was one of many reasons that his music never reached a substantial degree of popularity outside of Africa. But in 1989, during a solo San Francisco gig, Paul Kantner found himself joined by former bandmate (and lover) Grace Slick and two other ex-Airplane members for a cameo appearance. This led to a formal reunion of the original Jefferson Airplane (featuring nearly all the main members, including co-founder Marty Balin, but without Spencer Dryden, who had been kicked out of the band years earlier). Fela's songs were almost always over ten minutes in length, some reaching the twenty or even thirty minute marks. Solo careers and the attractions of other bands beckoned throughout. This is a common technique in African and African-influenced musical styles, and can be seen in funk and hip-hop. The lineup, however, had disbanded by 1990. The "endless groove" was also used, in which a base rhythm of drums, muted guitar, and bass guitar are repeated throughout the song.

The revamped lineup released Love Among The Cannibals in 1989. Therefore it was characterized by having African style percussion, vocals, and musical structure, along with jazzy horn sections. Like Pete Sears and David Freiberg before her, her career was downsized by the commercial entity Starship was embracing. The musical style performed by Fela Kuti was called Afrobeat, which was essentially a fusion of jazz and West African highlife. Grace Slick also left in 1988. Later, it was revealed that he succumbed to AIDS-related heart failure. The album went gold and featured the hits "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" and "It's Not Over ('Til It's Over)". It was announced that he died on August 2, 1997 in Lagos, Nigeria.

By the time No Protection was released, bassist Pete Sears had left. This led to rumors that he was suffering from an illness that he was refusing treatment for. In 1987 "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" was featured in the film Mannequin and hit # 1. His album output slowed in the 1990s, and eventually he stopped releasing albums altogether. Starship also had a Hollywood connection. Once again, Fela continued to release albums with Egypt 80, made a number of successful tours of the United States and Europe and also continued to be politically active. The album went platinum. On Fela's release he divorced his twelve remaining wives.

In 1985, Starship released Knee Deep In The Hoopla and immediately scored two # 1 hits with "We Built This City" and "Sara"; the first time any incarnation of the Airplane had had a # 1 hit. After twenty months, the regime changed once again and Fela was released from prison. Freiberg, who had been increasingly marginalized in the band, left as well. In 1983 he again ran for President but was again attacked by police, who threw him in prison on a dubious charge of currency smuggling. Kantner won his suit, and the group name was reduced to simply Starship, marking the third incarnation of the band. At this time, Fela created a new band called "Egypt 80" and continued to record albums and tour the country. In 1984, Kantner (the last founding member of Jefferson Airplane remaining) left the group, but not before taking legal action against his former bandmates over the Jefferson name (the rest of the band wanted to continue as Jefferson Starship). In 1979 he put himself forward for President in Nigeria's first elections for more than a decade but his candidature was refused.

Winds Of Change followed in 1982 and Nuclear Furniture appeared in May of 1984. He formed his own political party, which he called "Movement of the People". After the 1979 release of Freedom At Point Zero (which spawned the hit single "Jane"), Grace Slick suddenly returned to the band for one song, "Stranger" on their next album, Modern Times in 1981. Despite the massive setbacks, Fela was determined to come back. It didn't help that former Journey drummer Aynsley Dunbar had replaced Barbata, who had been injured in a car accident. The second was at the Berlin Festival after which most of Fela's musicians deserted him, due to rumors that Fela was planning to use the entirety of the proceeds to fund his presidential campaign. Thomas's soaring falsetto steered the band toward a harder rock sound, although critics somewhat unfairly compared the new Jefferson Starship to Journey. The year was also marked by two notorious concerts, the first in Accra in which riots broke out during the song Zombie which led to Fela being banned from entering Ghana.

Towards the end of 1978, the Starship (now without Grace Slick) recorded Light The Sky On Fire for The Star Wars Holiday Special, after which Balin too left the group, leaving Kantner and company to find a new lead singer in Mickey Thomas (who had sung lead on Elvin Bishop's "Fooled Around And Fell In Love"). In 1978 Fela married twenty seven women, many of whom were his dancers and singers to mark the anniversary of the attack on the Kalakuta Republic. After the debacle, she left the band. Fela and his band then took residence in Crossroads Hotel as the Shrine had been destroyed along with his commune. The following night, Slick, in a drunken stupor, shocked the audience by using profanity and sexual references throughout most of her songs. Fela's response to the attack was to deliver his mother's coffin to an army barrack and write two songs, Coffin for Head of State and Unknown Soldier referencing the official inquiry which claimed the commune had been destroyed by an unknown soldier. The first night, fans ransacked the stage after Slick failed to appear. Fela claimed that he would have been killed if it were not for the intervention of a commanding officer as he was being beaten.

However, Slick's alcoholism became a problem, which led to two nights of disastrous concerts in Germany in 1978. The Kalakuta Republic was burned, and Fela's studio, instruments, and master tapes were destroyed. The follow-ups, Spitfire (1976), and Earth (1978), were both big sellers. Fela was severely beaten, and his elderly mother was thrown from a window, causing fatal injuries. This line-up, which also included late-Airplane holdovers drummer John Barbata, fiddler Papa John Creach, and bassist-keyboarder-vocalist David Freiberg, along with Pete Sears, also playing bass and keyboards, and guitarist Craig Chaquico, proved to be the band's most commercially successful so far, although some Airplane fans were less than happy with its more mainstream direction. Balin's sophisticated ballad "Miracles" helped 1975's Red Octopus achieve multiple-platinum status. In one raid, one thousand soldiers attacked the commune. In 1974, the Airplane was formally reborn as Jefferson Starship, with Kantner and Slick as charter members; Balin came on board in time to record the hit single "Caroline" for the first Jefferson Starship album, Dragon Fly. The record was a smash hit with the people and infuriated the government, setting off vicious attacks against the Kalakuta Republic.

It was while that album was made that Kantner sealed his love affair with Grace Slick, and their daughter China Kantner was born shortly after. In 1977 Fela and Africa 70 released the hit album Zombie, a scathing attack on Nigerian soldiers which used the "zombie" metaphor to describe the methods of the Nigerian military. The Starship (such as it was) included David Crosby (of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young), Jerry Garcia (of The Grateful Dead), and even former members of Jefferson Airplane. He then recounted this tale in his release Expensive Shit. During the transitional period of the early 1970s, Paul Kantner recorded the album Blows Against The Empire with an ad-hoc group of musicians whom he dubbed the Jefferson Starship, marking the first-ever use of that name. Fela enlisted the help of his prison mates and gave the police someone else's feces, and Fela was freed. The live album 30 Seconds Over Winterland (1973) is now best remembered for its cover art, featuring a squadron of flying toasters. In response, the police took him into custody and waited to examine his feces.

Bark and Long John Silver were released on the band's own label, Grunt, with Joey Covington on drums and "Papa" John Creach on fiddle, after which the group effectively disbanded as Casady and Kaukonen converted their side-project Hot Tuna to a full time band. He became wise to this and swallowed the joint. Balin and Dryden left shortly thereafter. In 1974 the police arrived with a search warrant and a cannabis joint, which they had intended to plant on Fela. The band performed in an early "morning maniac music" slot at the Woodstock festival during this period. However, it was also very unpopular with the ruling government, and raids on the Kalakuta Republic were frequent. In the aftermath of the demise of the San Francisco scene, the band released Volunteers (1969), their most political venture; the title track, "We Can Be Together", "Good Shepherd", and the post-apocalyptic "Wooden Ships" were all highlights. Fela's music became very popular among the Nigerian public.

Crown Of Creation (1968) was a transitionary record, more structured than ...Baxters, whereas Bless Its Little Pointed Head (1969) captured their live sound, recorded at concerts at the Fillmore and the Fillmore East. The recordings continued, and the music became more politically motivated. After Bathing at Baxter's (1967) further showed their proficiency in psychedelic rock. Fela also changed his middle name to "Anikulapo" (meaning "he who carries death in his pouch"), stating that his original middle name of Ransome was a slave name. The album reached number 6 in the US album charts. Fela set up a nightclub in the Empire Hotel in which he performed in regularly first named the Afro-Spot and then the Shrine. The first of these, Surrealistic Pillow (1967), included two classic tracks, "White Rabbit" (inspired by the hallucinogenic drug LSD, then extremely popular in San Francisco, and Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland), and the rousing anthem "Somebody to Love", as well as a reminder of their earlier folk incarnation, Kaukonen's acoustic "Embryonic Journey". He then formed the Kalakuta Republic, a commune, a recording studio and a home for many connected to the band which he later declared independent from the Nigerian state.

Membership remained stable until 1970, by when they had recorded five more albums. Fela and his band, renamed "Africa 70", then returned to Nigeria. Amongst their fans, the group's name was further shortened to "the Airplane". The band then performed a quick recording session in Los Angeles, which would later be released as "The '69 Los Angeles Sessions". In 1966, Spence was replaced by jazz drummer Spencer Dryden and Anderson by singer Grace Slick, formerly of another San Francisco group, The Great Society. Soon, the Immigration and Naturalization Service were tipped off by a promoter that Fela and his band were in the US without work permits. Later in 1965, they signed to Record Corporation of America and recorded an album for release the following year called Jefferson Airplane Takes Off. While there, Fela discovered the black power movement through Sandra Isodere a friend of the Black Panther Party, which would heavily influence his music and political views and renamed the band "Nigeria 70".

The band gradually developed a more electric sound which led to Harvey's replacement by Kaukonen's childhood friend, Jack Casady in October 1965. In 1963 Fela moved back to Nigeria, re-formed Koola Lobitos and trained as a radio producer for Nigerian Broadcasting. In 1969 Fela took the band to the United States. Peloquin was a seasoned musician whose disdain for the others' drug use was a factor in his departure just a few weeks after the group began its career. Skip Spence then took the drum chair. In 1961 Fela married his first wife Remi with whom he would have three children (Femi, Yeni and Sola). The group made its first public appearance August 13, 1965 at The Matrix club in San Francisco. The style was a fusion of American jazz with West African highlife. They drew inspiration from groups such as the Beatles, the Byrds, and the Lovin' Spoonful, and built a local following at the Matrix Club. While there, he formed the band Koola Lobitos, playing a style of music Fela called Afrobeat.

Singer Marty Balin recruited another folk musician, Paul Kantner, blues guitarist Jorma Kaukonen, jazz and folk vocalist Signe Toly Anderson, drummer Jerry Peloquin, and acoustic bassist Bob Harvey. His parents sent him to London in 1958 with the intention of having him study medicine, but he decided to study music instead at the Trinity College of Music. This rock group formed on the west coast of the USA during the summer of 1965 in what was called the San Francisco Bay folk boom. His mother, Funmilayo, was a feminist active in the anti-colonial movement and his father Israel was the first president of the Nigerian Union Of Teachers. An urban legend claims this was the origin for the band's name, though according to band member Jorma Kaukonen the name was invented by his friend Steve Talbot as a satire of blues names such as "Blind Lemon" Jefferson [1] (http://www.jormakaukonen.com/bio.htm). Fela Kuti was born in Abeokuta, Nigeria to a middle-class family. The term Jefferson airplane is also slang for a used match bent to hold a marijuana cigarette that has been smoked too short to hold without burning the hands. Olufela Olusegen Oludotun Ransome-Kuti, October 15, 1938 - August 2, 1997), or simply "Fela", was a Nigerian multi-instrumentalist musician and composer, pioneer of Afrobeat music, human rights activist and political maverick.

Jefferson Airplane was inducted in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996. Fela Anikulapo Kuti (b. Various successor incarnations of the band have performed under different names, reflecting changing times and performer lineups, known as Jefferson Starship, and later simply Starship. Fela Live! Fela Anikulapo-Kuti and the Egypt 80 Band 1981, Recorded Live At Glastonbury, England. Jefferson Airplane was an American rock band from San Francisco, a pioneer of the LSD-influenced psychedelic rock movement. Fela In Concert 1981. Love Among The Cannibals (1989). Stephane tchal-Gadjieff & Jean Jacques Flori, Music Is The Weapon 1982, reissued in 2002 by Universal.

No Protection (1987). Tejumola Olaniyan, Arrest the Music! Fela and his rebel art and politics, Indiana University Press, 2004. Knee Deep In The Hoopla (1985). Various, Black President: The Art & Legacy of Fela Anikulapo Kuti, edited by Trevor Schoonmaker, 2003. Nuclear Furniture (1984). Various, Fela: From West Africa to West Broadway, edited by Trevor Schoonmaker, 2003. Winds Of Change (1982). Sola Olorunyomi, Afrobeat: Fela and the Imagined Continent, Africa World Press, 2002.

Modern Times (1981). Mabinuori Kayode Idowu, Fela, le combattant, Bordeaux (France), Le Castor Astral, 2002. Freedom At Point Zero (1979). Veal, Fela: The Life of an African Musical Icon, Philadelphia, Temple University Press, 1997. last album w/ Marty Balin. Michael E. Earth (1978).

Spitfire (1976). best-selling album for any incarnation of the Airplane/Starship. Red Octopus (1975). Dragon Fly (1974).

Long John Silver (1972) - US position: # 20. Bark (1971) - US position: # 11. first greatest hits collection. The Worst Of Jefferson Airplane (1970) - US position: # 12.

Volunteers (1969) - US position: # 13. Crown Of Creation (1968) - US position: # 6. After Bathing At Baxter's (1967) - US position: # 17. breakthrough album featuring "Somebody To Love" and "White Rabbit".

Surrealistic Pillow (1967) - US position: # 5. Jefferson Airplane Takes Off (1966) - US position: # 128. Download sample of "White Rabbit" from Surrealistic Pillow.