Blows Against The Revisionists!

It has become axiomatic to point to this album as representing the last gasps of a great but now disintegrating band. But despite the proximity of "Thirty Seconds Over Winterland" to the "Jefferson Airplane's" demise, this was not a group in its death throes, but rather a statement by a great collection of musicians from the depths of their greatest maturity.

Much has also been made of the fact that the band had by now broken up into two factions: one centered on Paul Kantner, the other made up of the "Hot Tuna" core of Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady. But if such factions existed, there was little evidence of it here. The real division, between Kantner and Airplane co-founder Marty Balin, had finally been resolved with Balin's leaving the group along with drummer Spencer Dryden. For years both Kantner and Balin had fought to become the defining creative force of the group, and this competition was evident on most all of the band's previous releases--including two previous live albums in which the music seemed almost to tear itself apart as a result of the attempts of Balin and Kantner and partner Grace Slick to outdo one another.

Here one finds none of that. Kantner was now firmly in charge, and the current line-up of musicians, including newcomers Papa John Creach, David Frieburg, and John Barbata, all made firm contributions to his creative vision. Kantner's music was at once deceptively simple and uniquely complex, with its continuous layering of sounds both instrumental and vocal. Most of all, it was incredibly disciplined, requiring each player to stay within certain bounds so as to allow the overall blend to reflect Kantner's sense of the larger creative vision. For the most part the group was content to do just that, and that included Kaukonen and Casady, who lent their considerable musicianship to setting the tone for Kantner's harmonies with Slick and Frieburg--who himself wisely did not try to emulate Balin's onstage hystrionics, even though he was nominally Balin's replacement. It says something about their respect for Kantner that the "Hot Tuna" crew saved their extended jamfest for one of Kaukonen's own tunes, "Feels So Good," and didn't try to do more with Kantner's songs than what they knew he wanted to get out of them.

The only disparate voices heard on this album were that of Creach, whose soaring violin added an untamed and raw quality that never quite jelled with the rest of the band, yet still managed to make its own mark in a way that would have been missed had it not been there; and Slick, whose occasional wisecracks betrayed the fact that, for all the storied political seriousness of the music, she was not above simply kicking back and having some fun once in awhile. Fortunately, these two restless souls managed to keep the music from becoming too ponderous--another description commonly used in connection with Kantner's writing, again without much accuracy.

All in all, this was the performance of a band in the full light of its adulthood, one which both understood its message and the best ways to share it, and did so with a quiet confidence and no hint of apology. All the growing pains were over, and if the end of this incredible group's life was just around the corner, then we should enjoy this album all the more for the way it showed the "Airplane" in its fullest flight.

This album now comes in two versions--the original seven-track version and a newer import with additional tracks and digital re-mastering. By all means get the expanded version, but don't overlook the original: shorter and rougher it may be, but it has its own internal logic, as well as a sound that evokes the atmosphere of the original performance as no studio reinvention ever could. Above all, forget the revisionist history--this album has nothing it needs to answer for!

Fans Only

This would not be the place to be introduced to the Jefferson Airplane. Good in places, bad in others this album sounds like the spirit is gone & Jack and Jorma couldn't wait to get back to Hot Tuna. It starts off well with an awsome version of Have You Seen The Saucers that by it's self makes this album worthwhile, but declines rapidly. A really awful version of Crown Of Creation. Milk Train is good but adds nothing to the original. The rest is played by a band of professionals in a workmanlike but uninspired performance. If you like the Airplane don't skip this one, but get Bless It's Pointed Little Head and Live at The Fillmore first & don't listen to Thirty Seconds Over Winterland next to them.

Thirty Seconds Over Today's Music Business

Well....being a long-time Airplane/Grace Slick fan (including her better vocal cuts after-the-Airplane, like 'Fast Buck Freddie') I'd have to say that this CD has stood the test of time and gotten better with age. Why? Because, unfortunately, the basic music business of the last 15 or so years has been dominated by essentially awful, vanilla 'clone-vocalists' (female AND male) complete with homogenized unison singing and writhing to a boring R&B beat and instrumentation with virtually no imagination or musical interest (except for perhaps Madonna and earlier Janet Jackson) - unless you are a teeny-bopper in which case it's all for you, kid.

Anyway - I used to listen to this album a lot (like all of my Airplane releases) and at the same time in the early 1970's go see the "Jefferson Starship" (by then) and compare. Hmmm....back then the Starship live concerts sounded better than this CD. And that vintage of live concert Starship (circa 1975-78) did A LOT of Airplane material, which was thrilling. Then, now, as always - Kantner's semi-acoustic stuff with Grace's vocals and harmonies have been the hallmark of the best [later] Airplane/Starship recorded or live music; and Grace's singing in virtually every concert I ever saw (not to mention very carefully recorded albums post 1970) was *stunning.* By then she'd lost a lot of weight, too, and looked very appealing again on stage. Whereas the Starship lived on for years, gradually dying away under the various internal pressures, the Airplane returned in 1989 for a brief but welcome (to the REAL fans, anyway) tour. They were just AWESOME, in 1989, live on stage. Grace, especially.

So it's great to go back in the past and especially revisit the "30 Seconds" CD, as it conjures images of those long-gone, very special, really big and famous bands; those that were seriously musical and fun to follow in the media and on the road.

Which is really saying something.