At Golden Gate Park [live]

by William RuhlmannBritish archival label Charly Records' Jefferson Airplane release At Golden Gate Park is billed on its back cover as the "first authorised release" of what annotator Jon "Mojo" Mills calls the band's "oft-bootlegged 7th May 1969 Golden Gate Park performance." Mills also calls this "the first official release" of the recording, but one must question what makes it official, much less authorized, as opposed to, say, "technically legal" in the sense that Charly has licensed it from Licensemusic.comAPS, "courtesy of ABC Entertainment Gmbh." Just as money can be laundered, it appears that illicit concert recordings can, too. It is hard to imagine that Jefferson Airplane would have authorized the release of this recording. It has been mastered at a low volume, and the recording, although it may come from a soundboard, favors the drums, the lead guitar, and some of the vocals, resulting in a distinctly inferior sound. Jefferson Airplane fans may nevertheless be interested in hearing a show at which the band performs versions of several songs due for release five months later on Volunteers: the title song, "The Farm," "Good Shepherd," and "We Can Be Together." The disc does not, however, contain a performance of "Mexico," listed as the 13th and final track. That is the title that is announced from the stage, but the band then plays "3/5 of a Mile in 10 Seconds" instead. That's the kind of mistake you expect with a bootleg, which is what this is in all but name.