Paul Kantner & The Jefferson Starship: Blows Against The Empire 1970 + Paul Kantner & Grace Slick: Sunfighter 1971 + Paul Kantner, Grace Slick & David Freiberg: Baron Tollbooth & The Chrome Nun 1973

 

Paul Lorin Kantner (March 17, 1941 – January 28, 2016) was an American rock musician. He is best known as the co-founder, rhythm guitarist, and a secondary vocalist of Jefferson Airplane, a

leading psychedelic rock band of the counterculture era. He continued these roles as a member of Jefferson Starship, Jefferson Airplane's successor band. Kantner was the first person approached by singer Marty Balin about putting together a folk-rock group in the mid-'60s in the San Francisco Bay Area. Jefferson Airplane was among the first and the most commercially successful of the San Francisco acid rock psychedelic groups of the '60s.
               

During the summer of 1965, singer Marty Balin saw Kantner perform at the Drinking Gourd, a San

Francisco folk club, and invited him to co-found a new band, Jefferson Airplane. When the group needed a lead guitarist, Kantner recommended Kaukonen. As rhythm guitarist and one of the band's singers, Kantner was the only musician to appear on all albums recorded by Jefferson Airplane as well as Jefferson Starship. Kantner's songwriting often featured whimsical or political lyrics with science fiction or fantasy themes, usually set to music that had an almost martial rock sound.
               

Jefferson Airplane formed in 1965 when Kantner met Marty Balin. Kantner eventually became the

leader of the group and led it through its highly successful late-1960s period. In 1970, while still active with Jefferson Airplane, Kantner and several Bay Area musicians recorded the album Blows Against the Empire, which was co-credited to both Paul Kantner and "Jefferson Starship".
              

The group began to fragment at the end of the decade, and Kantner released a solo album, Blows

Against the Empire, in 1970. It was followed by a duo album with his partner, Airplane lead singer Grace Slick, Sunfighter, in 1971, and a trio album, Baron Vol Tollbooth & the Chrome Nun, with Slick and David Freiberg (who had replaced Balin in the Airplane) in 1973.  
                 

Jefferson Airplane continued to record and perform until 1973. Kantner revived the Jefferson Starship name in 1974 and continued to record and perform with them through 1984. He later led

a reformed Jefferson Starship from 1992 until his death in 2016. Kantner had the longest continuous membership with the band, with 19 years in the original run of Jefferson Airplane and Jefferson Starship and 24 years in the revived Jefferson Starship. At times, he was the only founding Jefferson Airplane member to remain in Jefferson Starship. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Jefferson Airplane in 1996.
                   

Kantner died in San Francisco at the age of 74 on January 28, 2016, from multiple organ failure

and septic shock after he suffered a heart attack days earlier. Shortly after Kantner's death, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart called Kantner the band's backbone and said Kantner should have received the kind of credit that Slick, Casady and Kaukonen received. Coincidentally, he died on the same day as Airplane co-founder Signe Toly Anderson.
                

PAUL KANTNER & THE JEFFERSON STARSHIP - BLOWS AGAINST THE EMPIRE 1970

                     

Blows Against the Empire is a concept album by Paul Kantner, released in 1970 under the name Paul Kantner and Jefferson Starship. It is the first album to use the "Starship" moniker, a name which

Kantner and Grace Slick would later use for the band Jefferson Starship that emerged after Jack Casady and Jorma Kaukonen left Jefferson Airplane. From a commercial standpoint, it performed comparably to Jefferson Airplane albums of the era, peaking at No. 20 on the Billboard 200 and receiving a RIAA gold certification. It was one of the first two albums to be nominated for a Hugo Award in the category of Best Dramatic Presentation.  The original vinyl release is divided into two album sides. "Mau Mau (Amerikon)" launched Side One, a counter-culture manifesto and call to arms. In the context of the narrative, this is the free music being performed in the park, drawing everyone together.
                       

JERRY GARCIA & PAUL KANTNER

A bunch of left-wing hippies closely resembling his San Francisco Bay Area compatriots hijack a

government-built starship and head off to re-start the human race on another planet. Kantner had presaged this post-apocalyptic colonization idea on "Wooden Ships" on the last Airplane album, Volunteers, and here he expanded it out to album length with the help of members of The Airplane, the Grateful Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Service, and Crosby, Stills and Nash, plus assorted others, a shifting supergroup informally known as PERRO, The Planet Earth Rock And Roll Orchestra.
                        

Paul Kantner / Jefferson Starship – Blows Against The Empire
Label: RCA – 82876 67974 2, Legacy – 82876 67974 2
Format: CD, Album, Reissue, Remastered 2005
Country: US
Released: 1970
Genre: Rock
Style: Psychedelic Rock, Folk Rock, Acid Rock, Stoner Rock, Classic Rock

TRACKS

                 

01. Mau Mau (Amerikon)   6:37
Written-By – Slick, Covington, Kantner
02. The Baby Tree   1:44
Written-By – Sorrels
03. Let's Go Together   4:21
Written-By – Kantner
04. A Child Is Coming   6:18
Written-By – Crosby, Slick, Kantner
05. Sunrise   1:54
Written-By – Slick
06. Hijack   8:18
Written-By – Blackman, Slick, Balin, Kantner
07. Home   0:37
Written-By – Nash, Kantner, Sawyer
08. Have You Seen The Stars Tonite   3:43
Written-By – Crosby, Kantner
09. X-M   1:25
Written-By – Garcia, Hart, Kantner, Sawyer
10. Starship   7:02
Written-By – Blackman, Slick, Balin, Kantner

BONUS TRACKS        

    
11. Let's Go Together (Alternate Lyrics)   4:21
Written-By – Kantner
12. Sunrise (Grace's Acoustic Demo Tk.8)   1:21
Written-By – Slick
13. Hijack (Paul's Acoustic Demo Tk.5)   7:02
Written-By – Blackman, Slick, Balin, Kantner
14. SFX   2:02
Performer – Garcia, Hart
15. Starship (Live)   13:04
Written-By – Blackman, Slick, Balin, Kantner

LINE - UP

Paul Kantner – vocals, electric and acoustic guitars, banjo, bass machine
Grace Slick – vocals, piano
Jerry Garcia – banjo on "Let's Go Together" and "The Baby Tree"; pedal steel guitar on "Have You Seen the Stars Tonite"; sound effects and vocals on "XM"; lead guitar on "Starship"
David Crosby – vocals and guitar on "A Child Is Coming" and "Have You Seen the Stars Tonite"; backing vocals on "Mau Mau" and "Starship"
Peter Kaukonen – lead guitar on "Mau Mau"
Jack Casady – bass on "A Child Is Coming" and "Sunrise"
Harvey Brooks – bass on "Starship"
Joey Covington – drums and vocals on "Mau Mau"; congas on "Hijack"
Bill Kreutzmann – drums on "Let's Go Together"
Graham Nash – congas on "Hijack"; sound effects on "Home"; backing vocals on "Starship"
Mickey Hart – percussion on "Have You Seen the Stars Tonite"; sound effects and vocals on "XM"
David Freiberg – backing vocals on "Starship"
Phill Sawyer – sound effects on "Home" and "XM"

MAU MAU (AMERICON) LYRICS

Hide witch hide the good folks come to burn thee
Their keen enjoyment hid behind a gothic mask of duty

                              

Put your old ladies back into bed
Put your old men into their graves
Cover their ears so they can't hear us sing
Cover their eyes so they can't see us play
Get out of the way
Let the people play
We're gonna get down on you
Come alive all over you
Dancin' down into your town

You know tyrannosaurus rex was destroyed before
By a furry little ball that crawled along
The primeval jungle floor
He stole the eggs of the dinosaur
Close your eyes & create the sound
Open your hands & rebuild the ground
We are egg snatchers -
Flashin' sunshine children
Bunch of diamond thieves

You unleash the dogs
Of a grade-b movie star governor's war
While you sit in the dark -
Insane with the fear of dying
We'll ball in your parks
Insane with the flash of living

I'm alive
I am human
I will be alive again

                          

So drop your fuckin' bombs
Burn your demon babies
I will be again
Rabid lover-feelin' the starch in your grin
Callin' for acid cocaine and grass
And receiving your homemade gin
Push the button
Pull the switch
Cut the beam
C'mon make it march
Sign me up as a diplomat, my only office is the park

You need to be out before you come in
After you come you go
In the midst of yang is a smaller part of yin
And when it happens you know
The dawn comes

Hey dick
Whatever you think of us is totally irrelevant
Both to us now and to you
We are the present
We are the future
You are the past
Pay your dues and get outta the way
'Cause we're not the way you used to be
When you were very young
We're something new
We don't quite know what it is
Or particularly care
We just do it - you gotta do it
Let the music do it, take you there
Do it, do it, do it gotta do it
Something new, something new, something new
New, new

                          

Open your eyes there's a new world a-comin'
Open your eyes there's a new world today
Open your hearts people are lovin'
Open it all we've come to stay
I said, open it all we've come to stay
I said, open it all we've come to stay
People, hey you people, everybody
Us young people come to stay
I said, people, on relief
We've all come to stay
Open your eyes there's a new world a-comin'
Open it all we've come to stay
Yeah, yeah, yeah, open it all
Open it, open it, baby,
Now open that door

Flac Size: 399 MB

PAUL KANTNER & GRACE SLICK - SUNFIGHTER 1971

               

Sunfighter is a 1971 album created by Paul Kantner and Grace Slick from Jefferson Airplane. The album was released shortly after the Airplane album Bark was released, and is the second record

released on the Airplane's own Grunt vanity label, distributed by RCA Records. The album features a picture of their baby daughter, China Wing Kantner, on the cover. Many Bay Area musicians perform on the album, including all of the then current lineup of Jefferson Airplane, members of the Grateful Dead, Crosby, Stills, and Nash, and the horn group, Tower of Power. This album is also the first time a 17-year old Craig Chaquico recorded with Paul Kantner and Grace Slick. He would go on to become the lead guitarist for Jefferson Starship.
                 

DAVID CROSBY, PAUL KANTNER &  GRACE SLICK

This is something of a family album, co-credited to Paul Kantner and his partner at the time, Grace Slick, and featuring on its cover a photograph of their infant daughter, China. It also features the family

of San Francisco Bay Area musicians, including David Crosby, Graham Nash, Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead, and other current members of Jefferson Airplane and future members of Jefferson Starship. Its style of loosely arranged acid rock music and radical left political lyrics is similar to such recent albums as the Kantner/Starship Blows Against the Empire (December 1970) and the Airplane's Bark (August 1971), which were made by most of the same players.
                     

But Kantner and Slick's usual stridency is not counterbalanced by substance as much as on earlier

efforts, perhaps because they were making too many albums too quickly to keep up the quality of their songwriting. Still, anyone who enjoys the sweet-and-sour unison singing of X's John Doe and Exene Cervenka should listen to Sunfighter to see where they got it from.
               

Paul Kantner & Grace Slick – Sunfighter
Label: RCA – 07863 67421-2, RCA – 67421-2
Format: CD, Album, Reissue, Remastered 1997
Country: US
Released: 1971
Genre: Rock
Style: Psychedelic Rock

TRACKS

                

01. Silver Spoon   5:41
Written-By – Grace Slick
02. Diana - Part 1   0:52
Written-By – Slick, Kantner
03. Sunfighter   3:54
Written-By – Paul Kantner
04. Titanic   2:30
Written-By – Phil Sawyer
05. Look At The Wood   2:10
Written-By – Slick, Kantner
06. When I Was A Boy I Watched The Wolves   5:00
Written-By – Slick, Kantner
07. Million   4:04
Written-By – Paul Kantner
08. China   3:18
Written-By – Grace Slick
09. Earth Mother   3:19
Written-By – Jack Traylor
10. Diana - Part 2   1:02
Written-By – Slick, Kantner
11. Universal Copernican Mumbles   2:04
Written-By – Vierra, Gleeson, Kantner
12. Holding Together   7:42
Written-By – Slick, Kantner

LINE - UP

             

Paul Kantner – vocals, rhythm guitar
Grace Slick – vocals, piano
Jack Traylor – guitar on "Earth Mother", vocals on "Earth Mother"
Jerry Garcia – guitar on "When I Was a Boy I Watched the Wolves", "Million", and "Holding Together"
Papa John Creach – electric violin on "Silver Spoon" and "Earth Mother"
Craig Chaquico – lead guitar on "Earth Mother"
Bill Laudner – vocals on "Million"
Jack Casady – bass on "Silver Spoon" and "China"
Spencer Dryden – drums on "Earth Mother"
David Crosby – vocals on "Look at the Wood", "When I Was a Boy I Watched the Wolves", and "Diana 2", tambourine on "Look at the Wood"
Jorma Kaukonen – lead guitar on "Look at the Wood"
Graham Nash – Vocals on "Look at the Wood", "When I Was a Boy I Watched the Wolves", and "Diana 2", ARP synthesizer on "Diana 2"
Chris Wing – drums on "China"
Pat Gleeson – moog on "Universal Copernican Mumbles", piano on "Universal Copernican Mumbles"
John Vierra – synthesizer on "Universal Copernican Mumbles", keyboards on "Universal Copernican Mumbles"
Phill Sawyer – sound effects on "Titanic"
Peter Kaukonen – guitar on "Sunfighter", mandolin on "When I Was a Boy I Watched the Wolves"
Shelley Silverman – drums on "When I Was a Boy I Watched the Wolves"
Joey Covington – drums on "Silver Spoon", "Sunfighter", "China", and "Holding Together"
Edwin Hawkins Singers (Edwin Hawkins, Walter Hawkins, Tramaine Davis Hawkins, Elaine Kelley, Norma J. King, Barbara Gill, Ruth Wyons, Daphne Henderson, Shirley Miller, Eddie Bayers) – vocals on "Sunfighter"
Steven Schuster – flute on "Silver Spoon" and "Sunfighter", saxophone on "Sunfighter" and "China", horn arrangements on "Sunfighter", and "China"
Tower of Power (Greg Adams, Mic Gillette) – horns on "Sunfighter" and "China"

SILVER SPOONS LYRICS

                              

Throw down all your
Silver spoons
Eat all of the raw meat
With your hands  

Pick it up piece by piece
Pick it up piece by piece
Pick it up piece by piece

Where are the bodies for dinner?
I want my food

               

What if you were starving to death
And the only food you had was me
What would you say to the cannibal question
Would your answer be perfectly free?

My old mama told you never to eat your friends
With your fingers and hands
But I say you ought to eat what you will
Shove it in your mouth any way that you can

You think that I will come to your mouth
Looking for a home
But I get stuck sideways in your throat
Like a good old chicken bone

Where are the bodies for dinner?
I want my food!

Stay out the kitchen, children
The cook is cleaning his gun
He just got back from the open market
Shooting his food on the run

                    

My old mama told you never to eat your friends
With your fingers and hands
But I say you ought to eat what you will
Shove it in your mouth any way that you can

Sharpen your teeth for the family feast
Let all the hungry drool roll down your chin
Hide the human and bring out the beast
Let all the animal games begin

Where, a-where are the bodies for dinner?
I want my food!

You could learn to dine on your friends
Pour their bones into a cannibal soup
Muscles like steak and blood like wine
Save the brains to feed to troops

Hey, your mama told you never to eat your friends
With your fingers and hands
But I say you ought to eat what you will
Shove it in your mouth any way that you can

Scarlet juices oozing slow
Boiling in a human sea
Is it human dinner you're talking about?
Then slice me tender raw and lean

                          

Where, where are the bodies for dinner?
I want my food!

Oily fingers can hardly wait
Bodies slumped, face in plate
Wake up the drunks, the coffers on
The 14th course has come and gone

Why so long
All day sucker
I want your candy
Your candy has come and gone
And it's left you with your mouth wide open
Just humming
Cannibal songs
Cannibal songs

Flac Size: 247 MB

PAUL KANTNER, GRACE SLICK & DAVID FREIBERG - BARON VON TOLLBOOTH & THE CHROME NUN 1973

                   

Baron von Tollbooth & the Chrome Nun is a collaborative studio album by Jefferson Airplane members

Paul Kantner, Grace Slick, and David Freiberg, released in May 1973. All of the trio's then-fellow Jefferson Airplane members, John Barbata, Jack Casady, Papa John Creach, and Jorma Kaukonen, are featured on the album. Also appearing are David Crosby, Jerry Garcia, Mickey Hart, The Pointer Sisters, and Craig Chaquico (the future lead guitarist of Jefferson Starship).

 

 

Paul Kantner, Grace Slick & David Freiberg – Baron Von Tollbooth & The Chrome Nun
Label: RCA – 07863 67418-2
Format: CD, Album, Reissue, Remastered 1997
Country: US
Released: 1973
Genre: Rock
Style: Psychedelic Rock

TRACKS

              

01. Ballad Of The Chrome Nun   3:58
Written-By – Freiberg, Slick
02. Fat   3:13
Written-By – Grace Slick
03. Flowers Of The Night   4:17
Written-By – Jack Traylor
04. Walkin'   2:31
Written-By – Slick, Kantner
05. Your Mind Has Left Your Body   5:44
Written-By – Paul Kantner
06. Across The Board   4:34
Written-By – Grace Slick
07. Harp Tree Lament   3:36
Written-By – Freiberg, Hunter
08. White Boy (Transcaucasian Airmachine Blues)   4:14
Written-By – Paul Kantner
09. Fishman   2:40
Written-By – Grace Slick
10. Sketches Of China   5:14
Lyrics By – Grace Slick
Lyrics By, Music By – Paul Kantner

LINE - UP

Paul Kantner – vocals on all tracks except "Across the Board" and "Fishman", rhythm guitar on all tracks except "Across the Board" and "Fishman", glass harmonica on "Harp Tree Lament" and "White Boy"
Grace Slick – vocals, piano on all tracks except "Ballad of the Chrome Nun", "Flowers of the Night", and "Harp Tree Lament"
David Freiberg – vocals on all tracks except "Across the Board" and "Fishman", piano on "Ballad of the Chrome Nun", "Harp Tree Lament", keyboards on all other tracks except "Walkin'" and "Fishman"
John Barbata – drums, percussion
Chris Ethridge – bass on all tracks except "Your Mind Has Left Your Body", "White Boy", "Across The Board" and "Fishman"
Jerry Garcia – guitar on all tracks except "Flowers of the Night", "Your Mind Has Left Your Body", and "Harp Tree Lament", steel guitar on "Ballad of the Chrome Nun" and "Your Mind Has Left Your Body", banjo on "Walkin'"
Craig Chaquico – lead guitar on "Ballad of the Chrome Nun", "Flowers of the Night", and "Fishman"
David Crosby – vocals on "The Ballad of the Chrome Nun"
Jack Traylor – acoustic guitar on "Flowers of the Night", vocals on "Flowers of the Night", "White Boy", and "Sketches of China"
Jack Casady – bass on "Your Mind Has Left Your Body", "White Boy", "Across The Board" and "Fishman"
The Pointer Sisters – vocals on "Fat"
Papa John Creach – electric violin on "Walkin'"
Mickey Hart – gongs on "Your Mind Has Left Your Body" and "Sketches of China", water phones on "Your Mind Has Left Your Body"
Jorma Kaukonen – lead guitar on "Your Mind Has Left Your Body"

YOUR MIND HAS LEFT YOUR BODY LYRICS

                     

You have left your body be aware if you care
Your mind has left your body and for this one moment you are
Under the polar ice cap in a place we call home

How is it there white bear like that where you grow...

Now all of you come back to here and now elsewhen to there
Move on out the other way where...
Do you find yourself floating growing there

              

Riders of the rainbow
Let it grow let it grow

You can exercise your mind on where you want to go
And why'can see the city lights flashin' two thousand miles below you
You can feel the sands of Zanzibar or pierce the nearest sun
Find out what and who you are and if you need to run

                            

Riders of the rainbow
Let it grow let it grow

There is one moment in your life and it can come at any time
And you remember all of what went on from the instant you were born
Through your early years

And if you can fasten on that moment and expand through the afterglow
You can reverse your mind in time and travel back to when
The earth was formed
The sky was born
And the universe began

                

Riders of the rainbow
Let it grow let it grow

You have left your body
Return when you may

Save it for another day... beyond you

Flac Size: 247 MB

 
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