Surrealistic Pillow

I think I considered getting this album a long time ago, because I really like the singles 'Somebody to Love' and 'White Rabbit', but then I learned the lead vocals weren't always Grace Slick and lost interest. I still like those songs, but the rest of the album feels fuzzy and old. Not bad, just not interesting to me. Also, what's up with (Jefferson) Starship? That's some confusing CSNY type stuff. Also, the one-two punch of 'Somebody to Love' - 'My Best Friend' is calling out for a double Queen mashup!!

Highlights: 'Somebody to Love', 'How Do You Feel', 'White Rabbit'

Two of the songs from this album are absolute hits, Somebody to Love and White Rabbit. The album overall wasn't bad, but man do those two songs stand above the rest of it.

This feels more psychedelic than rock for most of the tracks. Seems they put way too much patchouli in the peace pipe on this one. The two singles (aka the Grace Slick songs) still slap and stand out as anomalies on an otherwise rather dated album.

This album felt very nostalgic despite me never hearing most of the songs before. That is with the exception of Embryonic Journey which ends my favorite show of all time, Friends. Other than that beauty, every song is good at least. It felt like I was in my grandparents car listening to 60s on 6, which is a station I'll need to check out again after finishing this list to see how many songs I recognize. This album may not be my preferred style of music, but it's always great when you listen to something you aren't used to and absolutely love every second of it. Jefferson Airplane is definitely a band I now intend on listening to more of. Thanks 1001 Albums for this gem.

I often see Surrealistic Pillow discussed as being one of the greatest albums of the whole '60s psychedelic counter culture scene, and I honestly think I see it. This is really a record that is more than the sum of its parts, and that I think really works best as a single work. The brightness of psychedelia meets the breeziness of folk music here, and a lot of these songs reflect this. The songs on here are largely brisk, occasionally even vignette-like, and it does really cool things for the pacing here, and helps the album maintain its kind of surreal, psychedelic tone. And speaking of this album's tone, it has something really unique going on. Little streaks of darkness manifest here, minor passages, oddly textured moments, and unusual lyrical ideas here help counter-balance the aforementioned brightness here, resulting in a more complex, mature sounding work. I honestly consider a lot of these songs to be among my favorites: She Has Funny Cars, Somebody To Love, Today, Comin' Back To Me, and D.C.B.A.-25. And let's not forget the ending here. White Rabbit is an iconic piece of Alice In Wonderland inspired psychedelia, and Plastic Fantastic Lover has some of the most interesting lyrical and textural work on the whole album. I will say, I'm not as into My Best Friend or 3/5 of a Mile in 10 Seconds, but they don't really get in the way of my enjoyment of this album. I can absolutely see why this is considered the cream of the crop of the San Fransisco psych scene. This album is fascinating, well written, and it's aged well to boot.

Boring as fuck

I bought a 'Best of Jefferson Airplane' album once and it was basically 80% of this album with like three or four other songs stuck in. I think that kind of sums up how I feel about them too. This is a good album, the highs are really high - Somebody to Love and White Rabbit are two of the best songs from the 60s. At least for this kind of music. The lows of this album are pretty low but still listenable. It definitely deserves a spot on this list though being one of the seminal records of psychedelic rock and really of the 60s in general. For me, I like a few of the songs a lot but could take or leave the rest. 3/5

I prefer boarding the Starship compared to the Airplane, but this is an all-time classic for sure!

I really don't care for the vocals here, but when an instrumental track came up it made me realize that this band has some really impressive instrumentation. Love the subtle, surf-y guitar playing throughout, as well as the not-so-subtle guitar solos in the blues tracks. Decent 60s joint!

Standouts: My Best Friend • Today • Embryonic Journey • In The Morning

When I was 17 I heard Grace Slick and the Great Society and was spellbound by Grace's powerful performance. She has an eerie, cult-leader like voice and a talent for storytelling. The comparatively rough and ready live recordings of songs which end up on this record are an absolute delight. What I prefer to that live record is that the band let each idea ride out for long stretches before returning each time to the core of the song at play. Things on this studio Jefferson Airplane records are (to my ears) a little bit more straightforward, and the improved quality of the recordings does not enhance the overall production. I also just love Grace Slick's voice, and I'm not nearly as enamoured with the male singer who sings on the majority of these songs. Its objectively a great album but that early experience of being blown away by something similar, but substantially different has left a mark on me.

Embryonic journey forever ingrained because of the Friends finale
Nice 60s album, good instrumentation. Just doesn't crack outstanding album for me, maybe because too many 60s/70s on here. 3*

Some of the most well known '60s psych for a reason. This is a really solid release.

So we all know Somebody To Love and White Rabbit, not only some of the greatest songs of the 60s, but easily of all time. Classic songs still played on classic rock radio, songs featured on every classic rock playlist. But what about the other 9 songs? Well, they're okay I guess. I'm sure like with many albums on this list this album is more influential than anything, and it most certainly is in many ways, but were the two songs were or was the whole album? Not to say the album is bad, it wasn't, but there's a reason why those two songs specifically will stand the rest of time.

I was not prepared for how boring this would be. Obviously 'Someone to Love' and 'White Rabbit' are classic rock standards. And for good reason. But 'Coming Back to Me', what the heck, how can a song this bad actually make it onto a album? Oh jeez, now I just got to 'How do you Feel', it's even worse!

Really liked this all the way through - can see it growing on me even more. Folky but also with a rock edge, I liked the multiple vocalists and I thought there was a good variety of sounds here.

Finally found the Similac Child sample (Today).

So many things to like about this album. The mix of pop, folk and psychedelia, all with an oh-so San Franciscan vibe. It could be described as ramshackle if the songs themselves weren't so perfect. The band was packed with major talents, all of whom shine at different times in different ways. Marty Balin, Paul Kantner, Grace Slick, Jorma Kaukonen, Jack Cassady and Spencer Dryden, yowza.

This type of music would normally tick all the boxes for me – 60s music? Yep / Psychedelic? Yep. But I was a bit ambivalent. I know two songs of theirs (I am not including We Built This City), Somebody to Love (heard on the film the Cable Guy) and White Rabbit (insert any Vietnam War film) and like the fact that both of these are used in films to indicate discord and confusion. While both of these songs are happily on this album it didn’t really do anything for me as a whole, with songs that are nice but not very interesting musically. I think its indicative of the fact that although I have heard of the group, I have never felt inclined to buy an album.

Super-dated sound, but really good music. White Rabbit and Somebody to Love are stone cold classics, but there's a lot to like in the album's other tracks, including Today (nice mellow track with an interesting guitar part), Comin' Back to Me (another nice mellow track - really like the guitar parts on this album), 3/5 of a Mile in 10 Seconds (good rocker), and Embryonic Journey (really nice fingerstyle guitar). Plastic Fantastic Lover didn't hit me at first but grew on me. Well worth hearing.

Тут є пісня від якої тошно (Somebody to love), бо юзали її тупо всюди, але в цілому - дуже непоганий альбом тієї епохи.

Але щось я не можу слухати загалом подібну музику 60х без якогось враження ніби дивлюсь фільм про ті часи. Не виходить бути об'єктивним, бо вся ця музика для мене звучить як саме референс до епохи, а не щось окреме.