JEFFERSON AIRPLANE

Well, I am not sure that JA needed to risk their legend on this album. But after the final crash of that awful Starship (which had lost its Jefferson moniker some four or five years earlier), which had no link at all with the original group, Grace Slick and the other reunited in its almost classic line-up. Everybody was present from either Hot Tuna or other projects. Only Spencer Dryden was missing, and from what I gathered, they simply thought he would not be interestred, which turned out to be false.

But was the Airplane going to succeed in a second take-off, or was this a just-once reunion? Well it turned out to be a one-shot deal and when listening to the album, we can safely say that, it was not going to last too long. After a strong start with the first three songs being of the calibre of bark or LJS, and the excellent Ice Age (Kaukonen- penned), unfortunately when you expect the album to really head for the higher atmosphere with the promising Summer Of Love, things come to an almost-crash. Indeed this Balin-penned track is a syrupy ballad, and no matter how much a frequent Airplane flyer you are, it is insipid and mediocre. Unfortunately, this was not just one air-hole; the flight would become quite turbulent for the rest of the album.

On the up-side of things, one could've expected disaster with such a risqué album, but JA avoids a few traps that other classic bands fell into later: the usual awful drumming of that 80's period is not present here (well just one track). Their drummer does have the sound of 80's drummers but plays very much the 70's way throughout most tracks (well playing with Casady as your bassist will kick your butt in to shape), and although not great, the drumming is fitting. I wish groups like T2 or Procol Harum (with the awful Prodigal stranger album), had not fallen into this trap (set by the industry), but JA had too much a rebel attitude left in them, to refuse too much pressure. Unfortunately the second part of the album is made of sub-par tracks that have a filler feeling to them. The instrumental Upfront Blues being the better track in the end of the album, this gives a clear view that most of the members brought their own songs beforehand and therefore few (just one IMHO) were written collegially.

Hardly essential, even for the more die-hard fans, this album is not far from the level of Bark or LJS, and almost on-par with the better Jefferson Starship albums, and certainly better than the dreadful Starship crap discs.

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