Jefferson Airplane- Surrealistic Pillow- Grace Slick,the late Marty Balin & Paul Kantner

If one were to attempt to carve in three dimensions the zeitgeist of the Summer of Love in 1967 America, you would have to chisel the Jefferson Airplane’s second album Surrealistic Pillow  ( Rolling Stone magazine latest Top 500 All Time list #471) into any Mt. Rushmore of Rock containing three other  classics of the time. While The Doors  debut and Sgt.Pepper’s… showed us where rock was heading, and Are You Experienced   by Jimi Hendrix Experience seemed positively from some future dimension, Surrealistic Pillow  by the Jefferson Airplane had LSD-inspired songs and sounds unapologetically butted up next to breezy vocal singalongs clearly influenced by the hit hootenany pop style of the Mamas and the Papas. It is that anachronistic Jekyll-and-Hyde crazy quilt that makes Surrealistic Pillow  a more representative  snapshot, possibly, than any recording of its time.

Jefferson Airplane co-founder singer/songwriter Marty Balin (who passed away 2018), Grace Slick, and rhythm guitarist/songwriter Paul Kantner,  who passed away in 2016, joined me in this classic rock interview for the essential landmark recording Surrealistic Pillow released the first week of February 1967. – Redbeard