Deep into December 1969, I took the train into New York for my interview at Columbia University.  I remember walking up from the train station in Harlem, past the football field, onto campus where I was questioned by a recently graduated hipster completely unlike anyone I had previously encountered in the college application process.  I believe it was our discussion of movies and music that led to my acceptance.  But what I remember most about that blustery day was my stop at the local newsstand, where I purchased my very first issue of  "Roling Stone", for the ride back to Connecticut.

The cover featured a pink scan of Mick Jagger and there were endless pages dissecting the tragedy at Altamont.  There was news that only I thought I was interested in.  I got home and I instructed my mother to cut a check, I needed to subscribe to "Rolling Stone".

My first issue came a few weeks later, along with a copy of Jefferson Airplane’s "Volunteers".

We were all familiar with "White Rabbit" and "Somebody To Love".  But although I heard "Surrealistic Pillow" at parties, I’d never purchased it, or "After Bathing At Baxter’s", or "Crown Of Creation", never mind "Bless Its Pointed Little Head".  But a free record from the San Fransisco icons?  That I wanted.

I was enraptured by "Volunteers".  I can sing every note on the album.  Not only the title track and their take on "Wooden Ships", but "Good Shepherd", and "Eskimo Blue Day".  They played "Eskimo Blue Day" over our high school public address system, on the faux radio show before class, and the station was bounced from the air for two weeks.  It might not mean shit to a tree, but to the administration, swearing over the intercom was a federal offense.

It was good to get out of jail, otherwise known as the public education system.  And towards the end of my first semester at Middlebury, my "Rolling Stone" subscription was drawing to a close.  I needed to re-up.  And stunningly, my money, around eight bucks if I remember correctly, was going to garner me TWO albums, "The Worst Of Jefferson Airplane" and "Blows Against The Empire".  Greatest hits albums have little impact, they don’t stick with you.  But concept albums, like this first opus from Paul Kantner’s Jefferson Starship, stay with you.  I had to download the tracks from Napster when the P2P system broke.  I needed to hear "Have You Seen The Stars Tonite".

They don’t make music like this anymore.  Every album needs a hit.  Or if it’s not made for Top Forty, it’s not made for anybody but fans.  Whereas "Blows Against The Empire" was a record you could play in your dorm room, no matter what was happening, and someone would always say "WHAT IS THIS?"

The record was ethereal.  It was an aural adventure.  It was not of a genre, but a personal vision of the artist.  And I thought of its best track, my favorite track, "Have You  Seen The Stars Tonite", as I had dinner on a hillock, a few miles from Ayers Rock, in the dark.

There were so many stars, you’d think it was a painting.  And the astronomer whipped out a telescope wherein we could see that so many of the stars were doubles, and colored.  It made me feel both insignificant, and part of something.  I was reminded of the old "Twilight Zone" episode "To Serve Man".  There HAD to be big foreheaded people out there, more developed than us.  There had to be SOMEBODY out there.

And when the southern cross was pointed out, I thought of that Crosby, Stills & Nash record.  Overplayed, but written in the spirit of wonderment.

We’re only here for a short time.  There are very few reference points that stick with us.  Two are the stars and the music.