Memorials

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Paul Kantner, Jefferson Airplane Co-Founder & Guitarist, Dies at 74

http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/rock/6859188/paul-kantner-jefferson-airplane-co-founder-dies-at-74

Jefferson Airplane guitarist, vocalist and founding member Paul Kantner has died. He was 74.

Kantner died Thursday (Jan. 28) of multiple organ failure. He had suffered a heart attack earlier in the week. Kantner's publicist confirmed the news with the San Francisco Chronicle.

From 1965-1972, Jefferson Airplane was a pioneer in the Bay Area counterculture psychedelic rock scene, first defining what became known as the "San Francisco sound."

Kantner and guitarist and vocalist Marty Balin formed the band in a bar called the Drinking Gourd, intending the group to be a folk-rock group. Amidst the city's drug experimentation, they developed something far more interesting.

As more and more flower children moved to San Francisco, Jefferson Airplane's local following grew and it became the first of the city's psych-rock bands to sign to a major label, releasing its debut Jefferson Airplane Takes Off in 1966. That same year, they became the first band to headline concert promoter Bill Graham's now legendary Fillmore Auditorium.

By the following year, the band's second album, Surrealistic Pillow, became a soundtrack to the Summer of Love. It hit No. 3 on the Billboard 200 with the help of singles "Somebody to Love" and "White Rabbit."

Jefferson Airplane performed at the three most famous American rock festivals of the 1960s' -- Monterey in 1967 and Woodstock and Altamont in 1969. In 1996, Kantner was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for his work with the band.

Kantner is the first of Jefferson Airplane's founding members to have passed away. He was also a founding member of the group's spinoff band, Jefferson Starship. which took off in 1974.

Kantner is survived by three children: sons Gareth and Alexander and daughter China. Funeral arrangements are pending.