Line #61 Music/SurrealisticPillow


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/jefferson_airplane02_8535.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:''Surrealistic Pillow''.]]
3
4	''Surrealistic Pillow'' is the second studio album by Music/JeffersonAirplane, released in 1967 through Creator/RCARecords. It is generally considered to be their strongest album, most popular and critically acclaimed. It is their first album with vocalist Grace Slick and drummer Spencer Dryden (Nephew of Creator/CharlieChaplin), replacing Signe Toly Anderson and Skip Spence respectively. Spence did write "My Best Friend" for this album, however and he and Anderson appear on "Don't Slip Away", "Come Up The Years" and "Chauffeur Blues" on the UK version of the album. These three songs originally appeared on their previous album ''Music/JeffersonAirplaneTakesOff''.
5
6	Hits include "Somebody to Love", "My Best Friend", "Embryonic Journey" and "White Rabbit".
7
8	----
9	!! Tracklist (Standard Version):
10	[[AC:Side One]]
11	# "She Has Funny Cars"
12	# "Somebody to Love"
13	# "My Best Friend"
14	# "Today"
15	# "Comin' Back to Me"
16
17	[[AC:Side Two]]
18	[numlist:6]
19	# "3/5 of a Mile in 10 Seconds"
20	# "D.C.B.A. - 25"
21	# "How Do You Feel"
22	# "Embryonic Journey"
23	# "White Rabbit"
24	# "Plastic Fantastic Lover"
25	[/numlist]
26	----
27	!! Tracklist (UK Version):
28	[[AC:Side One]]
29	# "My Best Friend"
30	# "3/5 of a Mile in 10 Seconds"
31	# "D.C.B.A. - 25"
32	# "How Do You Feel"
33	# "Embryonic Journey"
34	# "Don't Slip Away"
35
36	[[AC:Side Two]]
37	[numlist:7]
38	# "Come Up the Years"
39	# "Chauffeur Blues"
40	# "Today"
41	# "Comin' Back to Me"
42	# "Somebody to Love"
43	[/numlist]
44	----
45	!! Bonus Tracks (2003 Reissue):
46	[numlist:12]
47	# "In the Morning"
48	# "J.P.P. [=McStep=] B. Blues"
49	# "Go to Her (Version Two)"
50	# "Come Back Baby"
51	# "Somebody to Love (Single Version)"
52	# "White Rabbit (Single Version)" / "D.C.B.A. - 25 (Instrumental)"
53	[/numlist]
54	----
55	!!Principal Members:
56	* Signe Toly Anderson - backing and lead vocals [[note]]Only on the previously released tracks from the UK version of the album[[/note]]
57	* Marty Balin - lead vocals, guitar, percussion, tambourine
58	* Jack Casady - bass, guitar
59	* Spencer Dryden - drums, percussion
60	* Paul Kantner - guitar, vocals
61	* Jorma Kaukonen - guitar, vocals
62	* Grace Slick - lead vocals, piano, organ, recorder
63	* Skip Spence - drums [[note]]Only on the previously released tracks from the UK version of the album[[/note]]
64	* [[Music/TheGratefulDead Jerry Garcia]] - guitar
65
66	----
67	!! Embryonic Tropes:
68	* AliceAllusion: "White Rabbit" is one entire shout-out to ''Literature/AliceInWonderland'' and ''Literature/ThroughTheLookingGlass'':
69	** In the novel Alice drinks medicine that makes her grow and shrink in an instant, this after she followed a white rabbit into the rabbit hole.
70	--> ''One pill makes you larger and one pill makes you small''
71	--> ''(...) Go ask Alice, when she's ten feet tall''
72	--> ''(...) Call Alice when she was just small''
73	--> ''And if you go chasing rabbits''
74	** Alice also meets a caterpillar who smokes from a water pipe.
75	--> ''Tell 'em a hookah-smoking caterpillar has given you the call''
76	** Alice meeting the Red and the White Knight on a giant chessboard is from ''Through The Looking Glass''
77	--> ''When the men on the chessboard get up and tell you where to go''
78	--> ''(...) And the White Knight is talking backwards''
79	** The Red Queen in the novel orders a lot of decapitations, which is changed into a clever pun here.
80	--> ''And the Red Queen's off with her head''
81	** The Dormouse is a character from when Alice meets the Mad Hatter and the March Hare.
82	--> ''Remember what the Dormouse said. Feed your head.''
83	* AntiLoveSong: "Somebody to Love" describes nothing but depressing situations and tells the person (s)he needs somebody to love. This may sounds like a PepTalkSong about ThePowerOfLove, but when you think of it makes it actually worse since the person to whom the song is addressed to is already in a lot of despair and would probably get even more depressed if someone told him or her that she is also totally alone and without someone to love.
84	* BoDiddleyBeat: "She Has Funny Cars" is based on this beat.
85	* BoleroEffect: "White Rabbit" uses this effect in the melody. In fact, Grace Slick herself said that Ravel's ''Boléro'' was the other major influence on the song (besides Carroll's novels and LSD).
86	* CoverVersion: Technically "Somebody to Love" and "White Rabbit" are covers of songs by Slick's previous band The Great Society (though only the former had been released before she left the band).
87	* DeliberatelyMonochrome: The album cover is in black-and-white.
88	* DespairEventHorizon: "Somebody to Love" tells the protagonist that since "your friends treat you like a guest" he better find somebody to love.
89	* DesperatelyLookingForAPurposeInLife: "D.C.B.A. - 25"
90	--> ''I take great peace in your sitting there''
91	--> ''Searching for myself, I find a place there''
92	* EverythingsBetterWithBunnies: Especially "if you go chasing rabbits", as "White Rabbit" tells us.
93	* FaceOnTheCover: A group photo of the band.
94	* FollowTheWhiteRabbit: "White Rabbit"
95	--> ''And if you go chasing rabbits''
96	--> ''And you know you're going to fall''
97	--> ''Tell 'em a hookah-smoking caterpillar''
98	--> ''Has given you the call''
99	--> ''Call Alice, when she was just small''
100	* {{Instrumental\|s}}: "Embryonic Journey".
101	* LyricalColdOpen: "Somebody to Love".
102	* MushroomSamba: "White Rabbit", where imagery of Creator/LewisCarroll's most famous novels is used as a metaphor for drug hallucinations.
103	* NewSoundAlbum: Less Folk (The influences are still noticeable, however), More Psychedelic.
104	* NonAppearingTitle: "She Has Funny Cars". The line doesn't appear in the lyrics.
105	* OdeToIntoxication: "White Rabbit", which has become the StandardSnippet to play whenever a film or TV scene evokes people enjoying hallucinogenic drugs.
106	--> ''One pill makes you larger and one pill makes you small''
107	* OneWordTitle: "Today".
108	* PepTalkSong: "She Has Funny Cars"
109	--> ''We live but once, but good things can be found around in spite of all the sorrow''
110	* ThePowerOfFriendship: "My Best Friend".
111	--> ''Ah, you're my best friend''
112	--> ''(You are my best friend)''
113	--> ''And I love you so well''
114	* ThePowerOfLove:
115	** "Today"
116	--> ''Today everything you want''
117	--> ''I swear it will all come true''
118	--> ''Today, I realize how much I'm in love with you''
119	--> ''With you standing here''
120	--> ''I could tell the world what it means to love''
121	** "How Do You Feel?"
122	--> ''Just look at her walk''
123	--> ''Do you see what I mean?''
124	--> ''She is coming our way''
125	--> ''Oh, how my heart beats, I don't even think I can talk''
126	--> ''How do you feel?''
127	* PsychedelicRock: This album is one of several albums that helped to define the sound of the Summer of Love.
128	* RecordProducer: Rick Jarrard (who was also working with Music/HarryNilsson around the same time).
129	* QuestioningTitle: "How Do You Feel?"
130	* SecondPersonNarration: "Somebody to Love".
131	--> ''Don't you need somebody to love?''
132	--> ''Wouldn't you love somebody to love?''
133	--> ''You better find somebody to love.''
134	* {{Sexbot}}: Marty Balin ''claims'' that "Plastic Fantastic Lover" was a paean to his new stereo system (or maybe TV--the story varies), but the description of it as a lover with "chrome-coloured clothes", and the references to "Data Control and IBM" make it clear that he was trying to imply a little more -- possibly influenced by some of Kantner's SF collection.
135	* ShoutOut:
136	** "White Rabbit" is a shout-out to ''Literature/AliceInWonderland'' and ''Literature/ThroughTheLookingGlass''. The band based the melody on Music/MauriceRavel's "Bolero" and was also inspired by a similar bolero heard on Music/MilesDavis' ''Music/SketchesOfSpain''.
137	*** A line from "White Rabbit" inspired the book "Go Ask Alice" (1971), a book about drug addiction.
138	** "Embryonic Journey" was used (among other films) in the series finale of ''Series/{{Friends}}''.
139	*** "White Rabbit" and "Somebody to Love" are also well-used in media. Odds are good that, if you're watching a program or a film about or set in the Sixties, you'll hear one of those two songs. [[AnachronismStew Even if it's the very early Sixties]]. "White Rabbit" in particular has become the StandardSnippet to play whenever characters are taking hallucinogenic drugs.
140	* SpecialGuest: Jerry Garcia from Music/TheGratefulDead plays guitar during "Today", "Comin' Back to Me", "Plastic Fantastic Lover" and "J.P.P. [=McStep=] B. Blues".
141	* WordSaladTitle: The album title, which was allegedly inspired by a comment from [[Music/TheGratefulDead Jerry Garcia]] about the music being "surrealistic as a pillow".

Context Music / SurrealisticPillow