Robert Plant was a crucial part of the evolution of Hard Rock music, if he hadn’t been the vocalist of Led Zeppelin, certainly things shouldn’t have been the same. The “Golden Gold” as he became known in the 70s, was a huge influence to many generations of singers and to this day is one of the most successful Hard Rock artists in the world. But he always had a really broad musical taste, not only listening to Blues or heavier bands. That can be seen in the kind of music he did after Led Zeppelin came to an end in 1980 due to John Bonham’s death.
Over the years he praised many bands from the 60s and one of them was Jefferson Airplane, which had Grace Slick on vocals. So to show a little bit more about Plant’s love for the group, we selected the two songs by them that the musician said were some of his favorites.
The 2 Jefferson Airplane songs that Robert Plant listed as favorites
“White Rabbit”
The first one is “White Rabbit”, one of their most famous tracks, which was released in 1967 on their second album “Surrealistic Pillow”. Talking with Charlie Rose back in 2005, he revealed which were some of his favorite songs of all time. One of them was “White Rabbit”. (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage) “If I got to the west coast, there were a lot of bands out there. I think Jefferson Airplane‘s ‘White Rabbit’ was really strong”.
The song was a success and peaked at number one in Canada and 8 on the United States charts. The group was formed in San Francisco, California back in 1965 and was active until 1973. One year later, a spin-off called Jefferson Starship was created and was quite successful. They had hits in the 80s like “Sara”, “We Built This City” and “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now”. That version of the band had Grace Slick and Paul Kantner.
Jefferson Airplane was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996 by Mickey Hart and Phil Leash from the Grateful Dead.
“She Has Funny Cars”
The second Jefferson Airplane song that Plant said was one of his favorites was “She Has Funny Cars”. The track is also from their 1967 album “Surrealistic Pillow” but it wasn’t as successful as their other hits.
He mentioned the track when he was invited to the BBC Radio 6 show “6 Music’s Festive Takeover” in 2021. In the show he listed some of his favorite songs of all time and explained why he loved them. (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage) “‘She Has Funny Cars’, taken from ‘Surrealistic Pillow’ (1967) on RCA Victor. One of my favorite bands of all time, Jefferson Airplane. I got a painting two months ago from Grace Slick. She sent me a magnificent painting of me holding a microphone. But sadly I was dressed as a white rabbit. She also put some very interesting comments on the back,” Robert Plant said.
Jefferson Airplane received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award back in 2016. They reunited in 1989 and 1996.
