The Great Society (aka The Great! Society!!) were a San Francisco rock band that existed between 1965 and 1966, and were closely associated with the burgeoning Bay Area acid rock scene. Best known as the original group of model turned singer, Grace Slick, the initial line-up of the band also featured her then-husband Jerry Slick on drums, his brother Darby Slick on guitar, David Miner on vocals and guitar, Bard DuPont on bass, and Peter van Gelder on flute, bass, and saxophone. Miner and DuPont would not remain with the band for the duration of its existence.
In the late summer of 1965, Grace, Darby, and Jerry were inspired by The Beatles to start their own group, assembling it fairly quickly. Grace has also said that seeing Jefferson Airplane perform for the first time was an influence as well. The band made its debut at the Coffee Gallery in San Francisco's North Beach section on October 15, 1965 and continued to perform throughout 1966.
The band released only one single during its lifetime, the Darby Slick penned "Someone to Love" (b/w "Free Advice"). The single was issued in February 1966 on Autumn Records' tiny Northbeach subsidiary label and made little impact outside of the Bay Area. While signed to Autumn Records, the band worked with the label's staff producer, Sylvester Stewart (better known as Sly Stone), who at the time was still in the process of forming his own band, Sly and the Family Stone. Purportedly, Stewart would eventually walk out as the band's producer after it took The Great Society over fifty takes to record a version of the song "Free Advice" that was suitable for release.
Momentum for the band began to build as they started opening for Jefferson Airplane and other successful local bands, with Columbia Records offering The Great Society a recording contract. By the time the contract arrived in the mail, however, Grace had been spirited away to replace departing vocalist Signe Toly Anderson in the Airplane, taking "Someone to Love" and her own composition, "White Rabbit", one of Great Society's live showcases, with her. Jefferson Airplane went on to record "Someone to Love" (retitled as "Somebody to Love") and "White Rabbit" themselves, with both songs being issued by the band as singles during 1967, reaching #5 and #8 on the Billboard Hot 100 respectively. As both the visual and musical focal point, the band could not survive without Grace Slick and disbanded in the fall of 1966. Grace and Jerry Slick would divorce as well.
After Grace Slick had found fame with Jefferson Airplane, Columbia Records released tapes of live performances by The Great Society in 1968, on the albums Conspicuous Only in its Absence and How It Was. These two albums were later repackaged as a double LP named Collector's Item in 1971. This double album has been issued twice on CD, once by Edsel Records in 1989, under the title Live at the Matrix, and again in 2008 under its original title. In 1995 Sundazed Records released the Born to Be Burned compilation, featuring both sides of the band's debut single along with a number of previously unreleased studio recordings.
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