RIP Spencer Dryden - may you follow that rabbit

[gkg]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=495&ncid=762&e=7&u=/ap/20050113/ap_en_mu/obit_dryden

down the hole... and find a new adventure.

[spencer]

Again... Not familiar, but the guy shares a first name with me, so that\'s not cool.

Kinda like that movie American Splendor, Harvey Pekar feels bad when he finds out the other Harvey Pekar dies.  

[gkg]

this Spencer was the drummer for Jefferson Airplane so i\'m not too surprised you don\'t know him.

Spencer is a good name - the son of a friend of ours is named Spencer - he\'s a very good guitarist too, from what i\'ve heard.

[spencer]

Neat stuff, I\'m only a mediocre guitar playing spencer myself, so it\'s good to hear that there\'s one good spencer guitar player in California.  We Spencer\'s have to keep it real!  

And by the way, I\'m familiar with Jefferson Airplane through VH1.  But I haven\'t heard them :-/

[gkg]

get the CDs - they\'ve reissued stuff - there is some really wonderful imagery in some of their lyrics and some good music in general.  hard for me to put it in words - some one here can do it better - Travis? Oldfolkie?  anyway - for reference alone they are worth your checking them out.

[oldfolkie]

Don\'t know how I missed this earlier.  

Jefferson Airplane - he was their drummer - was one of THE bands in the late 60\'s/early 70\'s.

Surrealistic Pillow was a mainstay album of my high school years & still their defining album. They took Alice in Wonderland to a whole new level. Sex, drugs & rock\'n\'roll. Oh man, those were the days. Grace Slick put acid in Pat Nixon\'s tea (remember Nixon? ha!! remember acid? ), everything was psychedelic , the legends are endless.

It sounds like a very sad ending. May he RIP indeed.

Surrealistic Pillow is available on CD now, remastered & with extra tracks. It is simply great music. Google Jefferson Airplane & check out their site if you\'re interested. PEACE  

[gkg]

absolutely.  i still can\'t quite find the words though to discribe the music - it\'s not just rock, there was a jazz element to it, a sort of bluesie thing too... trippy and yet there was an edge...

what was it Maurice sang?  "ah yes - i remember it well..."

[oldfolkie]

It\'s a hard sound to pin down. Grace Slick\'s voice is almost like traditional British folk (think Maddy Prior or June Tabor), especially on White Rabbit & Somebody to Love. The guitar solos were unique, but for me they defy labels - Jorma Kaukonen was influenced by groups as far apart as the Carter Family and Howlin\' Wolf - Today & Embryonic Journey for instance. And Spencer Dryden had quite a bit of jazz in his background, and really put some interesting touches on White Rabbit. So there\'s country & folk & regular rock in there along with blues & jazz, plus a touch of whatever they were on at the time.   like I knew them. But we spent so much time with the music you felt like you DID know them, in a way. The music just wormed its way into your head.

Don\'t know, I have difficulty with it too. I think they just took neat stuff from all their influences, tossed it down the rabbit hole, and it all came together just right.

I guess I "remember it well" because I was a little too young to get really brain-fried. You know the old cliche - "if you remember the 60\'s you weren\'t there". I was 14 in 1967, when Surrealistic Pillow came out.

[gkg]

I guess I "remember it well" because I was a little too young to get really brain-fried.

exactly - me too - only it had a weird bent for me - i was 6 and just learning English in 1967 - watching my parents\' friends tripping and dancing like nutters.