Marty Balin Dead at 76

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Jefferson Airplane Co-Founder Marty Balin Dead at 76 - Our Tribute
www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-n3k7dAwcE



en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marty_Balin

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Jefferson Airplane Co-Founder Marty Balin Dead at 76
Hall of Famer and co-vocalist of San Francisco psychedelic rock band also founded Jefferson Starship

By ANDY GREENE
Rolling Stone

www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/jefferson-airplane-guitarist-marty-balin-dead-76-730912/

"Jefferson Airplane vocalist-guitarist Marty Balin, who co-founded the San Francisco psychedelic rock band in 1965 and played a crucial role in
the creation of all their 1960s albums, including Surrealistic Pillow and Volunteers, died Thursday at the age of 76. Balin’s rep confirmed the musician’s death to Rolling Stone,
though the cause of death is currently unknown.

“RIP Marty Balin, fellow bandmate and music traveler passed last night,” Jefferson Airplane bassist Jack Casady said in a statement. “A great songwriter and singer
who loved life and music. We shared some wonderful times together. We will all miss you!!!!”

“Marty and I were young together in a time that defined our lives,” Jefferson Airplane guitarist Jorma Kaukonen wrote on his blog. “Had it not been for him, my life
would have taken an alternate path I cannot imagine. He and Paul Kantner came together and like plutonium halves in a reactor started a chain reaction that still affects
many of us today. It was a moment of powerful synchronicity. I was part of it to be sure, but I was not a prime mover. Marty always reached for the stars and he took us along with him.”

Born Martyn Jerel Buchwald, Balin was a struggling folk guitarist on the San Francisco scene when he formed a band with Paul Kantner after meeting the 12-string guitarist
at a hootenanny. They met up with guitarist Jorma Kaukonen, bassist Jack Casady, drummer Skip Spence and singer Signe Toly Anderson and cut their 1966 debut LP Jefferson Airplane
Takes Off. They developed a strong following around the budding San Francisco rock scene, but became nationwide superstars in 1967 when Anderson left the group and
was replaced by Grace Slick.

Balin co-wrote five songs on their breakthrough LP Surrealistic Pillow , including “Comin’ Back to Me” and album opener “She Has Funny Cars,” and his tenor voice became
a key component of their signature sound. He played with the group at all of their most famous gigs, including the 1967 Human Be-In in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park,
The Monterey Pop Festival, Woodstock and Altamont. At the latter gig, Balin was brutally beaten by the Hells Angels after he dove into the audience to help an audience member
in distress. “I woke up with all these boot marks all over my body,” he told Relix in 1993. “I just walked out there. I remember Jorma saying, ‘Hey, you’re a crazy son of a bitch.'”

A little over a year later, Balin quit the group. “I thought everybody [was] kind of an asshole,” he said earlier this year. “It was a period of cocaine then…everybody took cocaine.
And people I would work with, they would yell at you and it got intense. The Airplane was on that kind of trip. You know, I personally just drank alcohol. But some of the chemicals
made people crazy and very selfish, and it just wasn’t any fun to be around for me. So I bailed.”

Balin spent a few years managing rock bands in San Francisco, but was pulled back into the group’s orbit by Kantner in 1974, though by this point Casady and Kaukonen had defected
and the remaining members were billing themselves as Jefferson Starship. The offshoot band was incredibly successful and scored more hits than the original Airplane,
including the Balin-penned “Miracles” from Red Octopus, hitting Number Three in 1975. But by 1978, Balin grew tired of touring, especially since Slick’s alcohol issues
caused many uneven performances, and he left the group for a solo career. In 1989, he participated in the short-lived Jefferson Airplane reunion tour and returned four years later
to Jefferson Starship, finally leaving for good in 2008.

In 2016, Balin underwent open-heart surgery at Mount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital in New York City. He later sued them for medical malpractice, claiming they caused him a myriad
of injuries, including a paralyzed vocal cord, bedsores, kidney damage and the loss of his left thumb and half of his tongue."

Jefferson Airplane - Today
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uokp0aEiT-A

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Jefferson Airplane - Turn My Life Down
www.youtube.com/watch?v=13Di9Uld7jw


When I see you next time round in sorrow
Will you know what I been going through
My yesterdays have melted with my tomorrow
And the present leaves me with no point of view
When I see you next time round look into my eyes
Where we'd be never could decide
Borrowed moments they cannot fill the moments of our lives
And wishful thinking leaves me no place to hide
No place to hide
No place to hide
I see the shadows softly coming
Taking me into a place
Where they turn my life down
Leaving mourning with myself
And nothing to say

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Marty Balin, Jefferson Airplane Co-Founder, Dies at 76
The singer's soulful tenor was a signature of the Airplane and Starship's sound.


variety.com/2018/music/news/marty-balin-jefferson-airplane-starship-dies-dead-1202961978/

By Jem Aswad
Variety
SEPTEMBER 28, 2018

"Marty Balin, a co-founder of Jefferson Airplane and a member of its later incarnation Jefferson Starship, whose high and soulful voice defined many
of both groups’ songs, died Thursday, his rep confirmed. He was 76; the cause of death was not announced.

His wife, Susan Joy Balin, was “by his side,” according to the announcement.

Although Balin had his greatest impact as one of the architects of the musical counterculture during his 1965-71 tenure in Jefferson Airplane, he had his greatest commercial success
when he rejoined the remnants of that group a few years later in Jefferson Starship, as the sole lead singer on both of that band’s singles to reach the top 10, “Miracles” in 1975
and “Count on Me” in 1978.

He was a member of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, having been inducted with other members of the Airplane in 1996. It was 20 years later that the band received the Recording Academy’s
lifetime achievement award, with Patti Smith writing in the Grammy Awards’ program book about her appreciation for “the soaring combination of Grace Slick’s acerbic wit and fearless
charisma and the romantic purity of Marty Balin.”


Born Martyn Jerel Buchwald, Balin was a young folksinger in San Francisco when he formed a band with fellow folkie Paul Kantner, who specialized in 12-string guitar.
The pair teamed up with guitarist Jorma Kaukonen, bassist Jack Casady, drummer Skip Spence and singer Signe Anderson as the Jefferson Airplane and released their debut album,
“Jefferson Airplane Takes Off,” in 1966. Anderson and Spence soon left the band and were replaced by Grace Slick and Spencer Dryden, respectively, and the group’s 1967 album
“Surrealistic Pillow” — featuring the Slick-sung hits “White Rabbit” and “Somebody to Love,” along with several songs co-written by Balin — vaulted the group into superstardom.
The harmonies between Slick, Balin and Kantner became a signature of the group’s sound.

Balin was a galvanizing member of both the band and the San Francisco scene, and in 1965 helped launch a club in the city called the Matrix that hosted many groups of the era,
ranging from the Airplane, the Doors and Janis Joplin to the Velvet Underground. He sold his interest in the club after the Airplane’s star began to rise.

Jefferson Airplane issued several more albums into the early 1970s and played at both Woodstock and Altamont (where he was famously knocked out by a Hell’s Angel after
trying to intervene amid the violence).

The group splintered in the early 1970s but several members, including Slick and Kantner, reunited as Jefferson Starship in the mid-‘70s, and Balin was persuaded to reunite
with his former partners during the recording of their debut album. His high tenor voice became a centerpiece of the group’s sound via hits like “Miracles” and “With Your Love.”
That group splintered as well before reuniting without Balin several years later as a pure pop outfit under the abbreviated name Starship.

Balin went solo and enjoyed a top 10 hit of his own in 1981 with the song “Hearts.” In 1989, he joined up with a short-lived Airplane reunion tour and returned four years later
to Jefferson Starship, finally leaving for good in 2008. His final solo album, “The Greatest Love,” was released in early 2016.

He underwent open-heart surgery in 2016 and later sued New York’s Mount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital for medical malpractice, claiming multiple injuries from the operations.
Balin’s illness rendered him unable to attend the Grammys when the Airplane was awarded lifetime achievement honors, but he released a statement at the time, saying, “
”I am grateful for the beautiful musical journey my life continues to take. To all my fellow Jefferson Airplane Band members, through its various metamorphoses, I thank you
for a dream come true.”

In a statement, Susan and Balin’s family issued a statement that noted how Balin “also enjoyed painting all his life. He painted vibrant, large-scale portraits of many
of the most influential musicians and good friends Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison and Jerry Garcia, to name a few.”

“Marty was the one who started the San Francisco scene,” says Bill Thompson, Balin’s roommate back in the mid-’60s and former manager of both Jefferson Airplane
and Jefferson Starship.

“Back in those days Marty was quite the businessman,” said Paul Kantner, who passed away in 2016. “He was the leader of the band on that level. He was the one who pushed us
to do all the business stuff, orchestrating, thinking ahead, looking for managers and club opportunities. He was very good at it.”

Balin is survived by Susan, daughters Jennifer Edwards and Delaney Balin, and stepdaughters Rebekah Geier and Moriah Geier.

“Marty and I shared the deepest of love — he often called it Nirvana — and it was,” Susan Balin said in a statement. “But really, we were all touched by his love.
His presence will be within my entire being forever.”"

[lucy]

lol