July 9, 1976 interview: Jefferson Starship in Niagara Falls

 

These folks had some killer weed. 

July 9, 1976 

Starship Cuts Loose

From ‘Airplane’ Aura 

          Up early to look at the Falls and stuff are the four musicians who’ve provided the underpinning that’s refashioned the ruins of San Francisco’s old Jefferson Airplane into the high-flying success of Jefferson Starship.

          As three of them talk in bassist-pianist David Freiberg’s hotel room, it’s clear that the Starship has cut free from the slippery psychedelic moorings of Airplane’s past.

          “This band has nothing to do with the Airplane,” says drummer John Barbata. “It’s a new band. Everybody contributes to the music. Think of us as the Starship.”

* * *

THREE STARSHIP albums (“Dragonfly” in 1974, the million-selling “Red Octopus” and their newest, “Spitfire”) will dominate their concert tonight at 8 in the Niagara Falls Convention Center.

          “The crowds are getting off on the new songs now,” Freiberg says. “They’re shouting for ‘Miracles’ and even for ‘Fast Buck Freddy’ as much as they do for ‘White Rabbit.’”

          Nine years ago that Alice-in-Wonderland anthem to pill-popping made the Airplane champions of an era experimenting with chemical change.

          The Starship, on the other hand, is a band of mild vices, with an appreciation for good booze.

* * *

“ME AND David are pretty much the vipers of the group,” says Barbata. “Pete here (Pete Sears, the other bassist-keyboardist) doesn’t drink or smoke because he’s into aerobatics, you know, stunt flying.

          “And Grace (singer Grace Slick) has lost a lot of weight and turned into an angel. She hasn’t even had a drop of champagne in four months.”

          “She’s in love,” one of them says.

          “Better just say she feels good,” another corrects him. “She’s in love with the world.”

* * *

THESE THREE rock veterans, plus 21-year-old guitar whiz Craig Chaquico, who’s elsewhere in the hotel, have given Starship a skillful ‘70s polish as deep as the old Airplane crew’s ‘60s iconoclasm.

          Barbata, an alumnus of the Turtles and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, was the first to come aboard. David Crosby schemed him into the band in time for the final Airplane flight, “30 Seconds Over Winterland.”

          Freiberg, who folksang with Airplaner Paul Kantner, came next after a stint with another Bay Area favorite, Quicksilver Messenger Service. Sears, who’s British, was studio sideman for Rod Stewart and played on Slick’s “Manhole” album.

* * *

THIS WAS the lineup that induced Paul Kantner and Slick to take the Starship on its 1974 test flight, which climaxed with the return of Airplane singer-songwriter Marty Balin.

          Though Balin continues to shun any contract that extends beyond the current album, the others are signed up for three more LPs. Work on the next one will begin next winter after a second tour this year in the fall.

          “That’s the secret to this band,” Barbata observes. “We make good records. The Airplane used to go in and turn their amps up and try to record everything at once. Things just aren’t done that way any more.”

* * * * *

IN THE PHOTO: Jefferson Starship in 1976 – From left, Pete Sears, David Freiberg, Paul Kantner, Marty Balin, Grace Slick, Craig Chaquico and John Barbata.

* * * * *

FOOTNOTE: Jefferson Starship has as many spinoffs and reincarnations as Star Trek and up until this point I was still a fan. This crew had a good run – “Red Octopus” topped the Billboard album charts – and they stayed up there in the firmament through 1978, when Marty Balin and Grace Slick left the band and Mickey Thomas became the frontman.

          Paul Kantner kept the warp drive sputtering along until 1984, when he quit, then fired it up again as Jefferson Starship: The Next Generation in the 1990s. Even though Kantner died in 2016, they’re still touring with David Freiberg at the helm. They’ll beam into the Del Lago Resort and Casino in Waterloo, NY, near Syracuse, next Thursday.