Jefferson Airplane: Surrealistic Pillow

Surrealistic Pillow

Best song: White Rabbit

Worst song: My Best Friend

Overall grade: 6

This is either a really high 5 or a really low 6 and I haven’t quite made up my mind, so I think I’ll fill in that bit at the end. Is it possible for a record to be dated in a good way? If so, Jefferson Airplane’s ‘Surrealistic Pillow’ certainly fits this definition. It’s a product of the times, and no part of it is relevant today, but it’s a wonderful document of the 1960s San Francisco hippy scene and the attitudes that went along with it.

I find this album interesting because it’s got a huge mishmash of writers (there are seven in total) so you get a very diverse range of approaches, and yet it still manages to stand together as a cohesive statement. Clever trick. Only one of the songs was written by Grace Slick, who was new to the Airplane here (it’s their second album overall but I don’t have the first one) and that’s ‘White Rabbit’. It’s a slightly creepy, slightly evil take on Alice in Wonderland, taking away the innocence of Alice’s dream and replacing it with drug metaphors. Grace’s voice is captivating throughout and I love the way it builds to a crescendo, but the song is far too short. I want it to go on for ten or fifteen minutes more.

There are other high points, though. ‘She Has Funny Cars’ sets the tone of the album right from its excellent drum opening, and the instruments in the backing play a blend of psychedelia and Fifties rock’n’roll. The two contrasting voices of Marty Balin and Grace Slick make for some really nice harmonies. ‘Somebody to Love’ follows, the biggest single. The vocals here are really over the top, but that makes sense in the context of the song.  And ‘3/5 of a Mile in 10 Seconds’ feels really spontaneous, and the instrumental jam part at the end foreshadows their next album (more on that later).

Then we have some more lightweight hippy stuff, namely ‘My Best Friend’ (named as the weak track only because I don’t think the album would suffer from its not being included) and ‘Today’. It’s a complete overload of positive feelings and friendship! They could probably get annoying really quickly, so don’t listen to either of them if you’re in a bad mood. The next song ‘Comin’ Back to Me’, is quieter, and although the lyrics are still happy and upbeat, it seems like a contrast to the previous two owing to its being in the minor key. I also want to shout out to ‘How Do You Feel’, just because it’s so chilled out. The whole band seem to be laid back just in the way they play their instruments – how did they do that?

Oh, I also like ‘Embryonic Journey’. Because it’s actually reminiscent of an embryonic journey… I’m pretty sure that’s just a more wordy way of saying ‘birth’.

You’ll notice that in most of these songs, I’ve focused more on the general feel of them than the actual content. That’s because the songwriting itself isn’t what makes this record stand out. That’s down to how well it captures how it must have felt to live through these times. As long as there are people who are vaguely interested in this period of history, people will listen to this and enjoy it and understand it, and that’s why I’ve decided to give it a 6.

Great title, too. ‘Surrealistic Pillow’. That’s awesome.