You left your mark on me (Marty Balin) (LP 426 - 428)

Bodacious DF Bodacious DF (Vinyl, RCA, 1973) ***

Marty Balin Balin (Vinyl, EMI America, 1981) ***

Marty Balin Lucky (Vinyl, EMI America, 1982) ***

 
Genre: American pop/rock

Places I remember: Marbecks (Balin), Amoeba Records - San Francisco (Lucky, Bodacious DF)

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Hearts (Balin)

Gear costume: I Do Believe In You (Balin), Heart Of Stone (Lucky) 

Active compensatory factors: When Marty Balin left Jefferson Airplane in 1971, he embarked on other projects until rejoining in 1975 (he left again in '78). 

One such activity was this one off album by a loose supergroup called Bodacious DF. What a ridiculous name. I never would have found this if it hadn't been positioned in the Airplane/Balin racks at Amoeba Records.

Other members of the band included personel from other San Francisco bands (Quicksilver Messenger Service, Country Joe and The Fish). 

Thanks to the bass moves, the music is funkier than Airplane's early style of folk/rock music. Marty is the lead vocalist and he proves he can do funk as well.

After leaving Airplane that second time, he went solo and produced regular solo albums right up until 2016. 

Balin was the first and Lucky the second; they are close in style - mianstream rock, and could be Volume 1 and 2 of a double album. 

Each has some great moments, with his trademark quality vocals. They utilise his strengths in a glossier package but class will out!

Where do they all belong? Sadly Marty passed away in 2018. It was a shock. I read about it on the train into London and gasped. Jacky asked me what was wrong - that sort of shock. 

No more creamy Balin vocals and wonderful music from this San Franciscian legend. 

RIP Marty.

All nite long (Jefferson Starship) (LP 270)

Jefferson Starship Earth (Vinyl - Grunt, 1978) ****

Genre: American pop/ rock 

Places I remember: Marbecks Records (Auckland, NZ)  

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: All Nite Long




Gear costume:  Count On Me




Active compensatory factors: Oh No, Not Marty too!! That was my first reaction when learning of his death this week.

Remember him as above in Count On Me - that voice and the cool melancholy of those lyrics. And the beautiful young face.

I love the whole album - Marty Balin's last with JS; it's been a firm favourite of mine since 1978. Mainly because it feels of a piece - there's a confident, laid back, casual swagger to the album. Encapsulated in All Nite Long's languid approach.

That video to Count On Me with David Freiberg and Grace Slick smiling on the couch and with a lovely ballad unfolding on a bed of acoustic guitars and harmony (real and sound wise) sums things up.

Now that Marty and Paul are no longer here, there is an added poignancy to the song.

Although it gets criticism for its pleasant songs and slickness, those are the things I love about this album. It sounds simple and effortless to my ears and so, it's an album I return to often.

Where do they all belong? Marty's joined Paul Kantner on board the hyperdriven starship. Look at them go!

Don't tell me things will work out fine, cos I know the truth and I'm running out of time (Marty Balin) #70 of 300 ish singles

Marty Balin Hearts/ Freeway (EMI F 8084,  1981)

Arr - the eighties.

Not a very forgiving decade to the Jefferson Airplane alumni like Starship and Marty Balin.

Marty is a colourful character: an original member of the Airplane, he's floated in and out of the Paul Kantner dominated picture during the years but the eighties was largely an unsuccessful attempt at a solo career.

In 1981, things looked okay for a start. He released his first solo album, Balin, featuring two Top 40 hits, Hearts (#8) and Atlanta Lady (#27). This was followed in 1983 by a second solo album, Lucky, along with a Japanese-only EP called There's No Shoulder. Lucky did not match the performance of Balin; it suffers from the worst kinds of eighties synth(etic) excess and his contract with EMI ended.

Hearts though is a nice melodic stab at the charts and deserved its success. Marty has such a great voice it's really unfortunate that his solo attempt coincided with the plastic decade.

Hidden gem: Freeway doesn't appear on the album Balin for some utterly bizarre reason. It's a great rocker. Hearts is a ballad so gets the A side obviously, that was what he had become known for, but Freeway is the better side. Yes it has the dreaded synths but it also has, shock horror, a GUITAR SOLO!!!!!