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2400 Fulton Street

Jefferson Airplane - 2400 Fulton Street Audio CD

A fair review of the Jefferson Airplane "2400 Fulton Street" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all Jefferson Airplane reviews here, or go back to the Jefferson Airplane tabs.

Band: Jefferson Airplane
Title: 2400 Fulton Street
Rating:

Release Date: 1990-10-25
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: It's No Secret 2: Come Up the Years 3: My Best Friend 4: Somebody to Love 5: Comin' Back to Me 6: Embryonic Journey 7: She Has Funny Cars 8: Let's Get Together 9: Blues from an Airplane 10: J.P.P. McStep B. Blues 11: Plastic Fantastic Lover 12: Wild Tyme 13: Ballad of You and Me and Pooneil 14: Small Package of Value Will Come to You, Shortly 15: White Rabbit 16: Won't You Try/Saturday Afternoon 17: Lather 18: Fat Angel 19: Last Wall of the Castle 20: Greasy Heart 21: We Can Be Together 22: Crown of Creation 23: Mexico 24: Wooden Ships 25: Rejoyce 26: Volunteers 27: Have You Seen the Saucers 28: Eat Starch Mom 29: Pretty as You Feel 30: Martha 31: Today 32: Triad 33: Third Week in the Chelsea 34: Good Shepherd 35: Eskimo Blue Day 36: Levi Commercials

No longer in-print, no longer the 'definitive' collection
It didn't sound too bad, better than the Jefferson Airplane CD's from previous years, the artwork was (and is) well-done and pretty cool, and the track selection was superb. When this came out in 1990 or so, it was easily THE compilation to get on Jefferson Airplane. However, it's been out-of-print for years, and when RCA/BMG merged with Sony, they released another two-disc compilation as part of Sony's "Essential" CD's. That set, titled "The Essential Jefferson Airplane," used the same mastering as the superb reissues produced by Bob Irwin in 2003, utilizing the original master tapes for every song and supposedly using EQ instructions given for the original Lp releases.

So what else is different? Well, the artwork on "2400 Fulton Street" is still better, a nice throwback to the late 60's (I think, I wasn't around then), and it has 36 tracks to "The Essential"'s 32, adding a few interesting choices like 'Triad' and some early Levi's commercial 'jingles' recorded by the band. However, the sound on "2400 Fulton Street" is subpar in comparison, and the shuffled order on "2400 Fulton Street" doesn't work that well.

The only reason for buying "2400 Fulton Street" is the price - as of this writing, there's a ton of used copies ranging from $5 to $10 being sold right here. If you're on a budget, I'd pick up one of those used copies, but if you've got a little more money to spend or prefer a better introduction to the band, get the "The Essential Jefferson Airplane. ".

This is it
I've been an Airplane fanatic for over 30 years - If someone were to ask me what's the Airplane CD they should buy to introduce themselves to their music, this would be it hands down(and I don't care how murky the sound is - this is an Airplane dream list! the music comes through loud and clear).

Nice Comp, Lousy Sound
Even vinyl played on a good system sounds WAYYY better. This excellent compilation is severely undercut by truly poor sound quality. But, now that the original albums have been nicely remastered from the original multitrack tapes, there is happily no need for you to shell out your bucks for this relic of the Dark Ages of digital remastering! Start with the reissue of ". . . Takes Off" and work your way up through the catalogue. Your head will be nicely fed.

The definitive (un-remastered) Jefferson Airplane collection
They developed over their brief career a deliberately loose, almost ramshackle sound that was integral to their appeal. Jefferson Airplane was the greatest of the late sixties San Francisco bands, of which there were many (hold your horses and read on, Dead fans). It was emblematic of the "San Francisco sound" that they helped create, but no other band of that time and place produced such energetic unpredictability with such tight musicianship, or with such a strong sense of melody, harmony and drama. Sure, the Grateful Dead emerged from the same scene and mastered that tight looseness too, but it took them longer to get good at it, and they never came close to the Airplane on intra-band vocal interplay. The Dead, of course, established a much greater legacy over three decades, but if we're talking San Francisco bands of the Airplane's creative era (roughly 1966-1970), then the Airplane is the champ. Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady were among the very best lead guitar-bass combinations in the rock era (comparable to the fully mature Jerry Garcia and Phil Lesh), and no other female rock singer ever equaled Grace Slick. She's in a league of her own, vocally, and she composed some of the most strikingly original songs of the rock era (think White Rabbit, Lather, Greasy Heart, Eskimo Blue Day, Mexico).

This collection, while lacking the remastering of the Airplane's music that occurred in the mid 90s, is still the most comprehensive collection of their best material available to this day. Of course it does not include all their good songs, but it includes all of their very best. And naturally, not all of the material here is equally good, but most of it is very high caliber. So if you love their music, this collection is the only reasonable alternative to buying each of their albums individually. It's debatable whether Jefferson Airplane ever produced a five-star album (I tend to think "Surrealistic Pillow' and "Volunteers" were, but barely). But four of their consecutive albums are worthy of at least four stars (the above two, plus "Crown of Creation" and "After Bathing at Baxter's"). In my scheme of rating, that is a phenomenal output for a band, and since this collection draws richly from all four of these, it seems obvious that Fulton Street should rate 5+ stars.

I do care, that you do see...
Apparently they lack the neccessary motivation to do so, however, since they continue to sell this rather murky-sounding edition, which dates back to 1987. It really wouldn't require much effort for RCA to assemble a better-sounding version of this set; after all, the individual albums were nicely remastered in 1995. It's a shame, because it _is_ the best Airplane compilation on the market, better than the too-slender _Worst Of_ or the moronic _Airplane/Starship Hits_.

You can see a complete list of all Jefferson Airplane discography, or go back to the Jefferson Airplane tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.