sweetcharmedlife wrote on Oct 30
th, 2008 at 10:45pm:
Happy birthday Gracie.Even though she thinks all old rock stars should stay off stage. In her day,she was the Queen of rock & roll. You will not be forgotten Gracie...Much love always. Fast Buck Freddie
I respect that opinion from crazy old Grace. But I only wish she had the decency to retire from the stage, or somehow end the whole Jefferson Starship by working on it with Paul Kantner, in the late 70s before the legacy of the Airplane was turned into one of the worst popular bands ever, Starship (Kantner left before the shittiness of Mickey Rogers/Slick n' co. due to the music's overt commercialism and legally got the band name changed... oddly enough Slick left for those reasons in the late 70s but yet came back to an even worse band. Needed the cash?).
Whenever the excellent vocalist and underrated writer Marty Balin hooked up with Jefferson, things went well. Even with the whole commercial revival with mainstream pop, producing the huge smash "Miracles," was an improvement on the Balin-less Starship (I think the name change came in 1972). His own career was too hung up on easy listening stuff, but he was my fave of the original members in the late 60s. Great singer and although all sources claim Slick never slept with Balin, they sure acted like they were knocking boots when on stage.
P.S. For you Stones buffs, Balin's the guy who got knocked silly by the Hell's Angels when the Airplane was on at Altamont before the Stones, in the documentary "Gimme Shelter."