POP-A-LOOZA: THE EVERLASTING FIRST! Jefferson Airplane and Jan & Dean

Each week, the pop culture website Pop-A-Looza shares some posts from my vast 'n' captivating Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do) archives. The latest shared post is an Everlasting First Quick Take of my introductions to Jefferson Airplane and Jan & Dean.

Jefferson Airplane's 1967 gem "White Rabbit" was one of the many, many tracks I considered for discussion in my long-threatened book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). A "White Rabbit" chapter was penciled into several of GREM!'s proposed Tables Of Contents, usually (I think) right after a chapter about the Velvet Underground, or maybe it was after Grandmaster and Melle Mel's "White Lines (Don't Don't Do It)." Drug culture would certainly have figured into my nascent idea of a Jefferson Airplane GREM! piece, but what I wanted to say seemed to fit more naturally in my chapter about Janis Joplin and Big Brother and the Holding Company. I do love "White Rabbit," and I wouldn't rule out returning to that track in the very hypothetical The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 2).

I'm not really much of a Jan & Dean guy. I respect them, and they were the masters of ceremony for my favorite concert movie The T.A.M.I. Show, but I rarely listen to them. Your mileage may vary, and I would advise you mind your MPH if you're approaching Dead Man's Curve. Meanwhile, my introductions to both Jefferson Airplane and Jan & Dean serve as the latest Boppin' Pop-A-Looza.

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This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/ You can read about our history here.

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THE EVERLASTING FIRST: Quick Takes For J [music edition]

Continuing a look back at my first exposure to a number of rock 'n' roll acts and superheroes (or other denizens of print or periodical publication), some of which were passing fancies, and some of which I went on to kinda like. They say you never forget your first time; that may be true, but it's the subsequent visits--the second time, the fourth time, the twentieth time, the hundredth time--that define our relationships with the things we cherish. Ultimately, the first meeting is less important than what comes after that. But every love story still needs to begin with that first kiss.

JAN & DEAN



In the mid-'60s, "The Little Old Lady From Pasadena" was a song that everyone on my block knew, like it was a part of the landscape. I remember playing on my neighbor Steve's swing set one day, and my friend Willie singing (in a falsetto) I'm the little old lady from Pasadena! Close enough, Willie. I don't remember any of Jan & Dean's other hits contemporaneously--knowledge of "Surf City," "Dead Man's Curve," and even Jan & Dean Meet Batman would come much, much later--and I didn't hear them singing "From All Over The World" until I caught The T.A.M.I. Show on a cable broadcast outta Canada in the mid-to-late '70s. Jan & Dean have never been nominated for induction into The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame.

JEFFERSON AIRPLANE



I knew "Somebody To Love," which was a big hit on the radio in 1967. I saw the Airplane lip-sync the song on American Bandstand. I may have made disparaging remarks about the length of the hair on those boys--I was an unenlightened 7-year-old--and I may have fallen in love with this vision of loveliness called Grace Slick. In the pages of Marvel's Not Brand Echh humor comic book, I giggled at the comments of a window-washer (who looked suspiciously like Ringo Starr) hailing the arrival of Stuporman by exclaiming, "Look! Up in the sky! It's a gooney bird! It's a Jefferson Airplane!" As a young teen in the '70s, I would fall hard for "White Rabbit," and borrowed my brother Rob's copy of the Surrealistic Pillow LP for further enlightenment. Never developed a taste for the Starship, though.

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Our new compilation CD This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4 is now available from Kool Kat Musik! 29 tracks of irresistible rockin' pop, starring Pop Co-Op, Ray Paul, Circe Link & Christian Nesmith, Vegas With Randolph Featuring Lannie Flowers, The Slapbacks, P. Hux, Irene Peña, Michael Oliver & the Sacred Band Featuring Dave Merritt, The Rubinoos, Stepford Knives, The Grip Weeds, Popdudes, Ronnie Dark, The Flashcubes,Chris von Sneidern, The Bottle Kids, 1.4.5., The Smithereens, Paul Collins' Beat, The Hit Squad, The Rulers, The Legal Matters, Maura & the Bright Lights, Lisa Mychols, and Mr. Encrypto & the Cyphers. You gotta have it, so order it here.