(Reprinted from the RCA Press Release - Just because !)

STARRING PAUL KANTNER, MARTY BALIN, GRACE SLICK - BLOWS AGAINST THE EMPIRE GUESTS DAVID CROSBY, GRAHAM NASH, JERRY GARCIA, MICKEY HART, BILL KREUTZMAN 


EXPANDED EDITIONS OF BOTH ALBUMS INCLUDE PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED BONUS CUTS (DEMOS, OUTTAKES, RADIO SPOTS, LIVE WINTERLAND PERFORMANCES), AND NEW LINER NOTES 

The countdown has begun for the launch of back-to-back celebrations of the 35th anniversary of 1970's BLOWS AGAINST THE EMPIRE, the first solo project by Paul Kantner and the first record to feature the name of Jefferson Starship, and the 30th anniversary of 1975's RED OCTOPUS, (with "Miracles"), the most successful LP in the Jefferson family canon. The first expanded editions of both albums, with previously unreleased bonus material and newly written liner notes, will arrive in stores September 13th on RCA/Legacy, a division of SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT. 

The BLOWS AGAINST THE EMPIRE and RED OCTOPUS expanded editions were produced for reissue by Bob Irwin. The two titles follow up April's The Essential Jefferson Airplane (also produced by Irwin), a two-CD, 33-song package, and the first newly remastered multi-disc compilation of their work to appear on the market in 13 years. It provides the perfect segue into the long-lived saga of Jefferson Starship. 

40 years after the birth of Jefferson Airplane in 1965 and the release of their first album in 1966, this summer finds Jefferson Starship on the road touring and recording virtually non-stop. The band continues to gather critical acclaim, thriving under the aegis of original JA founding members Paul Kantner and Marty Balin. Consistent touring throughout North America and Europe has nurtured a loyal audience, always eager to embark on a trip into the fantastic utopian realms of science fiction that were first unveiled on the revolutionary concept LP, BLOWS AGAINST THE EMPIRE. The album was nominated for science fiction literature's prestigious Hugo Award ­ the only recording in rock history to have been so honored. 

In 1970, the outer space rock opera found a willing list of guest collaborators on Kantner's wavelength, including David Crosby and Graham Nash (of Crosby, Stills & Nash), the Grateful Dead's Jerry Garcia, Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzman, as well as Airplane members Grace Slick, Joey Covington, and Jack Casady. "The Most Wanted Musicians list of a Dream," Kantner calls it in his prose-poem liner notes dedication to this new expanded edition. 

"Assembling the album's all-star cast," writes Jud Cost (of Magnet magazine) in his liner notes, "a Who's Who of West Coast rock at the time, was more 'an accident of geography' than intent, says Kantner. 'Everybody from the Grateful Dead to Santana to Quicksilver Messenger Service would be playing down the hall at Wally Heider's. As in movies, there's a lot of hurry up and wait in recording, so we'd wander into each other's studios and very casually stick our noses in and do things.' The Airplane's manager, Bill Thompson, notes, 'They gave us unlimited recording time at Wally Heider's, and Paul has that great ability to organize groups of people to put in their piece." 

The expanded edition contains five distinct bonus tracks, all of which are previously unreleased: a version of the album tune "Let's Go Together" with alternate lyrics; original acoustic demos of Grace's "Sunrise" and Paul's "Hijack"; a two-minute gem by Garcia and Hart entitled "SFX," and a live version of "Starship" recorded at The Fillmore West, contemporary with the album sessions. In addition, this expanded edition takes the wraps off three different vintage radio advertising spots for the album. 

40 years ago on August 13, 1965, Jefferson Airplane played its historic first gig at the opening night of the Matrix in San Francisco ­ prelude to the release of their debut LP on RCA Victor (Jefferson Airplane Takes Off) the following year. JA played its equally historic final gig (at least for the next 17 years) at Winterland on September 22, 1972. With the departure of Marty Balin (in 1970) and subsequent departures of Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady (to form Hot Tuna), the stage was set for the emergence of a new band in early 1974. Jefferson Starship began its first tour in April and recorded its first LP in July, titled Dragonfly (with "Ride the Tiger") which was released in October. 

It was Jefferson Starship's next album, however, that broke through beyond all expectations, matching and eventually surpassing the highest chart achievements of Jefferson Airplane at its prime in the '60s. RED OCTOPUS marked the long-awaited reunion of Kantner, Slick and most importantly Balin, whose lyrical imprint exploded on five of the original album's ten compositions. The return of Balin was felt on the 'power ballad' known as "Miracles," which rose to #3 and skyrocketed the album to a four-week double-platinum stay at #1 in Billboard, which listed it for 87 weeks. 

"Inspired by a woman in his life and by the Indian guru Satya Sai Baba," reports Jeff Tamarkin in his liner notes, "Marty had been painstakingly polishing his masterwork, 'Miracles,' for some time." Balin, still in the process of deciding whether he would just contribute tracks or fully re-join his bandmates, confessed to Tamarkin: "When they asked me to join again, I said, 'Well, I want to do a groove song. Let me do the kind of music I want. So they did, but when I cut it everybody went, 'I don't know about that, man, that's pretty lame.' I was really worried, because nobody liked it. But I told myself, after about five days, maybe they're wrong, and then they said, 'Okay, let the guy do it, he'll join the band that way.'" Tamarkin, author of Got a Revolution! The Turbulent Flight of Jefferson Airplane (Atria Books, 2003), has annotated some three dozen CDs from the archives of Jefferson Airplane, Starship, Hot Tuna, and other various band-member projects, including the 3-CD long box set of 1992, Jefferson Airplane Loves You. 

    PAUL KANTNER DISCUSSES PERRO

" I originally took it (Planet Earth Rock and Roll Orchestra) to publishers in the 80s but they couldn't quite figure out what it was about or if it was  any good even. The main question I got from them was "we don't know what shelf we'd put it on the bookstore. Is it a music book, a spy novel, an adventure, a screen play, a science fiction book." At that point I got pretty disheartened and was doing a lot of other things at the time so I didn't really pursue it. But then some fans among others, not by insistence but more request ...I got back into it.

 When we got our own website I decided to take the vanity publishing route and I did the whole thing myself on this little homegrown business that we do here on our website.  I went and re-edited, type-checked, spell checked and added this and that and put together a 500 page novel and a CD and combined it from the music from the same novel. We  are putting it up for sale on our website. 

There's a couple of other books that I am working on, one that I have already done called "The Nicaraguan Diaries," about a trip to Nicaragua.

 This is a step further down the line. I'm telling the people who liked the Airplane and the Starship, "Here's another step if you want to take it." Not this band, but this concept. I think our generation is already doing that, likening people to the prospect of being out there in a natural setting rather than it being some big science fiction place where big green guys are after you, or the moon is green cheese. It's a natural environment and that's the first step to getting people ready to go. It's like the way it was getting people ready to come to America, to go across in a covered wagon after they've lived in Vienna with Mozart and everything. "What do we wanna go in the fucking covered wagon for?" Because there's something there to do for those who want to do it. For the weirdos that want to do it. For the weirdos that wanna go. 



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