After bathing at Baxter's

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After bathing at Baxter's
Jefferson Airplane studio album

Publication
(s)

November 30, 1967

admission

June - October 1967

Label (s) RCA Victor

Format (s)

LP

Genre (s)

Psychedelic rock

Title (number)

11

running time

43:38

occupation

production

Al Schmitt

Studio (s)

RCA, Hollywood

chronology
Surrealistic Pillow
1967 		After bathing at Baxter's Crown of Creation
1968

After Bathing at Baxter’s is the third album by the American psychedelic rock band Jefferson Airplane . It was released in late 1967 and was the band's second studio album that year after Surrealistic Pillow .

Emergence

Surrealistic Pillow was a successful album for Jefferson Airplane and the record company RCA Victor with third place in the album charts and two top ten placements in the single charts . For them it was the first major success since Elvis Presley left the Army. The nominal producer Al Schmitt therefore gave the band the freedom to pursue any experiment they wanted to try. Grace Slick and Paul Kantner were mainly responsible for the lyrics and music on this album ; they pushed band founder Marty Balin into the background, who only wrote Young Girl Sunday Blues .

The album

After Bathing at Baxter’s contains eleven pieces that are grouped into five “ suites ”. It marked a departure from the radio standard song length of the previous two albums and showed Jefferson Airplane in a more experimental direction. The first part of the Street Mass suite is dedicated to folk rocker Fred Neil . With the sound collage A Small Package of Value Will Come to You, Shortly , the band follows in the footsteps of the Mothers of Invention , who at the end of their debut album Freak Out! had started similar experiments. It ends with Young Girls Sunday Blues , which is most reminiscent of earlier pieces. The War Is Over transitions from folk style to psychedelic delirium and exuberant Wild Thyme . Hymn to an Older Generation features Jorma Kaukonen, comparable to Jimi Hendrix and The Who , on guitar and ends with Grace Slick's excursion into literary psychedelia, a homage to James Joyce .

The second side of the album begins with Watch Her Ride , released as a single , which leads to Kaukonens, Spencer Dryden and Jack Casady's nine-minute instrumental improvisation Spare Chaynge . Shizoforest Love Suite closes the album with Paul Kantner's musical tribute to the first Be-In in San Francisco.

The comic-style cover, drawn by Ron Cobb, shows an airplane - the fuselage is a typical Haight Ashbury wooden house in Victorian style - with the album title in the banner.

reception

After Bathing at Baxter’s reached number 17 in the US charts, the released single The Ballad of You & Me & Pooneil number 42.

On January 20, 1968, the American Rolling Stone wrote in its review of the album that Jefferson Airplane could be the best rock and roll band in the United States with a few exceptions. The reasons for this are the strength of the band both live on stage and in the studio, plus the voice of Grace Slick, the compositions of Balin and Kantner, and the instrumental skills of Casady, Dryden and Kaukonen.

Bruce Eder of allmusic considers the album to be one of the purest psychedelic rock albums with few concessions to the mass taste and none to the radio . and writes that it is not the album for whoever starts listening to this band. He gave the album three and a half stars out of five.

Track list

page 1

Street crowd
  1. The Ballad of You & Me & Pooneil ( Paul Kantner ) - 4:30
  2. A Small Package of Value Will Come to You, Shortly ( Spencer Dryden , Gary Blackman, Bill Thompson) - 1:42
  3. Young Girl Sunday Blues ( Marty Balin , Kantner) - 3:29
The War Is Over
  2. Martha (Kantner) - 3:21
  3. Wild Thyme (II) (Kantner) - 3:05
Hymn to an Older Generation
  2. The Last Wall of the Castle ( Jorma Kaukonen ) - 2:46
  3. Rejoyce ( Grace Slick ) - 4:00

Page 2

How Suite It Is
  2. Watch Her Ride (Kantner) - 3:11
  3. Spare Chaynge (instrumental) ( Jack Casady , Dryden, Kaukonen) - 9:05
Shizoforest Love Suite
  2. Two Heads (Slick) - 3:10
  3. Won't You Try / Saturday Afternoon (Kantner) - 5:01

The 2003 CD release includes the following additional titles:

  2. The Ballad of You & Me & Pooneil (live version) 11:07
  3. Martha (single version, mono) 3:29
  4. Two Heads (Alternative Version) 3:18
  5. Things Are Better in the East (demo version) 6:40

Additional musicians

  • Bill Thompson: vocals
  • Gary Blackman: vocals

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Surrealistic Pillow in the US charts at Allmusic (English)
  2. ↑ a b c d e After Bathing at Baxter’s at Allmusic (English)
  3. ↑ Fred Neil at Allmusic (English)
  4. ↑ After Bathing at Baxter’s in the US charts on Allmusic (English)
  5. ↑ After Bathing at Baxter’s in Rolling Stone
  6. ↑ The LP does not contain any information. Times after discogs
  7. ↑ Title list of the CD release from 2003 at discogs

Web links