ROCK MOMENT – Jefferson Starship “Jane”
When Jefferson Starship released “Jane” in 1979, the band was in the middle of a major transformation. Gone was the psychedelic sound that had defined Jefferson Airplane a decade earlier, and even Jefferson Starship was undergoing personnel changes. Out of that uncertainty came one of the band’s hardest-rocking and most enduring songs.
“Jane” was written by David Freiberg, Jim McPherson, Paul Kantner and Craig Chaquico and appeared on Jefferson Starship’s 1979 album Freedom at Point Zero. The record was particularly important because it introduced listeners to the band’s powerful new lead singer, Mickey Thomas.
Thomas already had an impressive résumé. He had sung with the Elvin Bishop Group and provided the soaring lead vocal on Bishop’s 1976 hit “Fooled Around and Fell in Love.” When Jefferson Starship needed a new singer following the departure of Marty Balin, Thomas joined the group and brought a high, powerful voice perfectly suited to the harder rock sound the band was developing.
And “Jane” gave him one heck of an introduction.
The song begins with an instantly recognizable piano figure before the entire band crashes in. Guitarist Craig Chaquico gives the track its muscular rock edge, while Thomas delivers the vocal with an intensity that made it clear Jefferson Starship was entering a new era.
Lyrically, “Jane” is about a relationship that isn’t nearly as serious as one person thought it was. The singer confronts Jane after discovering that what he considered love apparently meant something very different to her. The frustration builds throughout the song until Thomas is practically unleashing the chorus.
Interestingly, the inspiration for Jane reportedly came from a real person. David Freiberg has explained that Jane was a woman who had been involved with his friend and fellow songwriter Jim McPherson. That personal connection helped provide the foundation for a song about romantic confusion and rejection.
Released as the first single from Freedom at Point Zero, “Jane” became a major success, reaching No. 14 on the Billboard Hot 100 in early 1980. It also helped the album reach the Top 10 and successfully introduced the Mickey Thomas era of Jefferson Starship.
The song also represented a dramatic change in the band’s sound. Jefferson Starship had enjoyed huge success earlier in the decade with songs including “Miracles,” “With Your Love” and “Count on Me,” but “Jane” was noticeably heavier. The guitars were louder, the production was bigger, and Thomas had the kind of voice that could soar above all of it.
That direction would eventually lead Jefferson Starship toward the polished arena-rock sound of the early 1980s and, following another round of personnel changes, the formation of Starship, which scored massive hits with “We Built This City,” “Sara” and “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now.”
But “Jane” occupies a special place in that history. It was the song that announced Mickey Thomas had arrived and that Jefferson Starship wasn’t interested in simply living off its psychedelic past.
More than four decades later, that opening piano still gives the song away almost immediately. Then the guitars kick in, Mickey Thomas starts climbing toward those seemingly impossible high notes, and “Jane” becomes exactly what Jefferson Starship intended it to be—a big, loud piece of classic-rock radio perfection.
