That said, this is a really good bootleg concert from the very beginning of Jefferson Starship. This concert took place only one month after the release of the first Jefferson Starship album, "Dragon Fly." Although it must be said what was a "Jefferson Starship" album was a bit vague, since they were a few albums already released from 1970 to 1974 with more or less usual bunch of musicians, especially Grace Slick and Paul Kantner. One, "Blows Against the Empire," had actually been credited to "Paul Kantner and Jefferson Starship" back in 1970. The reason for all these name changes is that the rights to the name "Jefferson Airplane" was shared by several band members, and that name couldn't continue to be used once Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Cassady left the band in 1973.
But at the time of this concert, the band was basically the same personnel as on the last Jefferson Airplane tour in 1973. Also, the music was still generally weird, influenced by the psychedelic sensibilities of the late 1960s. For instance, in this concert the band played most of the 1970 "Blows Against the Empire" album, which was kind of a science fiction concept album. So I basically consider this the last gasp of Jefferson Airplane (not counting their 1989 reunion). Just one year later, Jefferson Starship would have a huge hit with the ballad "Miracles" and go in a very different musical direction.
This concert is also somewhat historic in that Marty Balin joined in for the encore. He sang the song "Caroline," which had just appeared on the "Dragon Fly" album (and a song he cowrote with Paul Kantner). I'm not sure, but I think he stayed for the two songs after that as well. He had been one of the founders of Jefferson Airplane, but had left in 1971 due to musical and personal differences with other band members. So this was the first concert he'd played with his former band mates in three years. At this point, he wasn't an official member of the band, but he did join up a short time later. It was Balin's song "Miracles" that would take the band to the top of the charts in 1975.
This bootleg recording is an excellent sounding soundboard. It used to have some serious flaws, but I believe I fixed them. Despite being a soundboard, the mix was all over the place. There were parts where the vocals were too loud (which is rare, in my experience) or too quiet. It was the same with some of the instruments, such as the bass getting way too loud at times. But thanks to audio editing software like UVR5, I was able to separate out the different instruments and restore some balance.
The biggest trouble I had were with the first two songs, where the vocals sometimes got so low in the mix that even UVR5 couldn't find anything worth separating. For "Ride the Tiger," this was only a problem for the second half of the song. There was a portion that was a repeat from earlier in the song, so I patched in that section from earlier. There was another portion that was different and so quiet that I've basically kept that just as without vocals. For "Devil's Den," there were severe problems with the vocals for two verses in the first half of the song. I found a different soundboard bootleg from 1975, and patched in just the vocals for those bits from that one.
The bottom line is, although there was a lot of hassle for me, this should all sound great for you. The band toured a lot in 1974, even touring before recording the "Dragon Fly" album, but this seems to sound way better than any other bootleg from that year.
This concert is two hours and ten minutes long.
01 Ride the Tiger [Edit] (Jefferson Starship)
02 talk (Jefferson Starship)
03 Devil's Den [Edit] (Jefferson Starship)
04 talk (Jefferson Starship)
05 Wooden Ships (Jefferson Starship)
06 talk (Jefferson Starship)
07 Come Again, Toucan (Jefferson Starship)
08 talk (Jefferson Starship)
09 Hyper Drive (Jefferson Starship)
10 talk (Jefferson Starship)
11 Papa John's Down Home Blues (Jefferson Starship)
12 Better Lying Down (Jefferson Starship)
13 That's for Sure (Jefferson Starship)
14 talk (Jefferson Starship)
15 All Fly Away (Jefferson Starship)
16 talk (Jefferson Starship)
17 Come to Life (Jefferson Starship)
18 Milk Train (Jefferson Starship)
19 Sunrise (Jefferson Starship)
20 Hijack (Jefferson Starship)
21 Home - Have You Seen the Stars Tonite (Jefferson Starship)
22 XM - Starship (Jefferson Starship)
23 talk (Jefferson Starship)
24 Caroline (Jefferson Starship)
25 Somebody to Love (Jefferson Starship)
26 talk (Jefferson Starship)
27 Volunteers (Jefferson Starship)
https://www.imagenetz.de/ej2XG
alternate:
https://pixeldrain.com/u/8ngQ2XCr
I'm not sure, but I think the cover photo could be from this exact concert. It's from 1974, and one can see, from right to left: Paul Kantner (in the background), Grace Slick, and Marty Balin. I'm guessing it could be this concert due to the presence of Balin, who didn't appear in any other concert by the band in 1974. (This was the last show they played that year.) So the only way it's from another concert is if the year is wrong, which is possible.
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