Grace Slick picks the rockstar who embodies the 1960s
As the lead singer of Jefferson Airplane, Grace Slick witnessed the countercultural revolution of the 1960s firsthand. Lending vocals to some of the most iconic tracks of the decade with the Airplane, Slick was among the most prolific singers of the time. Looking back upon the period, the singer asserts that one rock star embodies the period more than anybody else.
Joining Jefferson Airplane in 1966, Slick quickly cemented herself as an incredible vocalist and songwriter. Contributing tracks from her previous band, The Great Society, including ‘Somebody to Love’ and the self-penned seminal track ‘White Rabbit’, Slick proved herself to be an irreplaceable member of the group. Although the band struggled to adapt to the post-hippie era of the 1970s, eventually forming Jefferson Starship, which led to the creation of the cringe-inducing 1980s pop rock track ‘We Built This City’, the brilliance of Jefferson Airplane is undeniable.
The pinnacle of Jefferson Airplane’s story comes in the form of their performance at Woodstock. Perhaps the most legendary festival in music history, Woodstock was the defining moment of the hippie movement. Following The Who, the Airplane took to the stage on Sunday morning, performing one of the most memorable sets of the weekend; no small feat when taking into account the absolutely stacked lineup.
Maybe the only Woodstock moment that rivalled Jefferson Airplane’s stunning performance of ‘White Rabbit’ came when guitar hero Jimi Hendrix set his Fender Stratocaster on fire. Hendrix needs no introduction, of course, the rock star is arguably the greatest guitarist of all time. According to Slick, Jimi encapsulated the counter-culture and musical revolution of the 1960s more than anyone else.
“The Beatles and the Stones may represent it as bands,” explained Slick in 2015, “Obviously Martin Luther King and JFK represent the sixties overall, but if you’re talking about rock probably Jimi is the guy”. Expanding upon the flair of Hendrix, she told Forbes, “The colour, the clothes, the fact that he flipped from being for the war in Vietnam to against it within a year, his music, his stunning guitar playing, his showmanship.”
The world lost Jimi Hendrix mere months after the 1960s drew to a close. Like many musicians from the period, Hendrix was plagued by substance abuse problems, a topic that is widely debated among music historians. As Slick remembers, the attitude towards drugs during the 1960s was very different, “We were taking drugs for fun, mainly. We wanted to test: How do you feel when you do this? Ooh, that’s interesting. LSD, oh, that’s nice. I want to relax.”
Grace Slick is a definitive artist of the 1960s and one of the greatest vocalists of all time, so it seems fitting for her to pay tribute to Hendrix, a fellow icon of the decade. The vocalist paid further tribute to the guitar hero in her autobiography, Somebody to Love? A Rock-and-Roll Memoir, which features some of Slick’s artwork surrounding Hendrix, as well as other contemporaries like Jerry Garcia and Janis Joplin.
