999,888: Millenium beyond - Jefferson Starship

In 1970, Jefferson Airplane guitarist Paul Kantner released the solo album "Blows Against the Empire" under the new band name "Jefferson Starship." A few years later, Jefferson Airplane was disbanded for good, as half of the band split off to form a "blues band" called Hot Tuna, and the other half decided to change their name permanently to Jefferson Starship. Their sound shifted from San Fransico pyschedelia to Foreigner-esque "arena rock" and they ended up selling quite a few records. Eventually, that band was whitled down to only one original member, Grace Slick, and renamed Starship. Then everybody got really old and started suing each other and touring under weird names like "Jefferson Starship the Next Generation" and Jefferson SPACEship*. It looked like it was all over for the Jefferson crew.

Then, in 1999, out of nowhere, Jefferson STARSHIP reunited, featuring Jefferson Airplane members Marty Balin, Paul Kantner and Jack Casady. Oddly enough, Casady had never been in Jefferson Starship, only Jefferson Airplane. So basically, he was replacing the guy who replaced him in a band he wasn't in.

It must have taken a lot for these aging rockers to put away their lawsuits and record again in 1999 under what was probably the only name whose copyright wasn't owned by a label or a band member who refused to participate. But our world was about to enter a strange new era known as the millenium, and we needed the guidance of Jefferson Starship - guidance they were kind enough to give us in the eight-minute epic "Millenium Beyond." I think they were going for a psychedelic trip-out along the lines of something off of "After Bathing At Baxters," their experimental 1968 album, but the whole thing comes off like the unintentionlly hilarious opening song of a "Rent"-style rock musical instead. "This is the year the machine fucks up" proclaim the Starship troopers in unision, hoping beyond hope that "Y2K" will lead us away from the shackles of technology and back to the agrarian utopia of their hippie aspirations. "These are the explosive years" wails Kantner, lamenting the loss of bowel control in the latter half of his fifties.

Kantner also gives us some predictions for what was in store in the coming millenium, predictions that have come all too true. Instead of the boring, vagina-birthed children of the nineties, he accuratly predicts that in the new millenium we would have "children born of space, concieved in light, fused in zero gravity. A new creature, descendent of Earth, born of sky." "Imagine, as well" he also sings, "the inexplicable fame of Kim Kardashian and the invention of iPhone Apps."**

As stupid as the whole thing is, I found it strangely touching. Jefferson Starship manage to somehow dig deep down and deliver some of that revolutionary feeling of their 1969 peak, and deliver it with complete sincerity. Maybe it helps that there are no irritating "modern" production tricks - no trip-hop loops, auto-tune or guest rappers. Instead, we're treated to the bittersweet spectacle of a group of burnt out hippies, giving it their all in the hopes of saving the world.***

*I made that one up.

**Also made up.

*** Paying the property tax on their vinyards.