Mobile Fidelity - UDSACD 2176  - SACD Hybrid Stereo - 

Numbered Limited  Edition - Plays On All CD Players 

Half Speed  Mastered by Rob LoVerde  from the Original Master Tape

Mastered on the Mobile Fidelity GAIN 2 Mastering Technology for Ultradisc  SACD  

Mobile Fidelity's Shawn R. Britton, assisted by Rob LoVerde, transferred the original master stereo tape to DSD, and the resulting SACD has the strengths and limitations of the source. 16-track recording was in its infancy in 1969: Volunteers was one of the first LPs recorded in the new format. Sound quality of the SACD is very good and faithful to the original (my reference is an RCA LP). Bob Irwin's remastering for the 2004 CD was an improvement over the mid-1990's CD issue, and Britton's is better still. I'm a firm believer that guitar and bass amp distortion and analogue tape saturation distortion—both in evidence on Volunteers—transfer more euphoniously to DSD than to PCM. The MoFi SACD is the version to own. HRaudio Review

Seminal 1969 Album Steeped in Revolution, Vitality, Protest: The Aural Equivalent of a Demonstration March, Jefferson Airplane's Uncompromising Volunteers Rooted in Belief Music Can Change World

Mastered from the Original Master Tapes: Wider,  Yield Superior Transparency, Rich Nuances, and Engaging Dynamics on Set Ranked #370 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time

Defiant, Assured, Cohesive Songs Filled With Driving Psychedelia, Rustic Country, and Crunchy Acid-Rock: Guest Musicians Include Jerry Garcia, Stephen Stills, and David Crosby

Awash in controversy and loaded with revolutionary protest, Jefferson Airplane's Volunteers stands as the last album made by the group's classic lineup and brings insurgent closure to the peace-and-love era. The potent 1969 record confronts war, politics, greed, and environmental ruin in head-on fashion matched by few peers. Steeped in the belief people and music could transform the world, it steers the band in community-minded and county-rock directions, and features charged playing by guest luminaries such as Jerry Garcia, Stephen Stills, David Crosby, and Nicky Hopkins. Volunteers also benefits from being one of the first 16-track recordings. And now, the historic set can be heard in the fidelity the artists and producers intended.

Mastered from the original master tapes  Volunteers teems with soul-affirming energy, dynamics, immediacy, and standout textures. The wider and deeper grooves translate into finer pacing, enhanced information retrieval, and superior transparency. Soundstages stretch far and extend back, with instrumental separation giving all of the musicians their own place in the mix. As a result, subtle albeit important details – Hopkins' rollicking piano, guitarist Norma Kaukonen's biting tones, Garcia's deft pedal-steel work – emerge in three-dimensional fashion amidst a musical canvas that manages to be both edgy and produced, raw and revealing. Jefferson Airplane has never sounded more vital.

Much had changed in America – and within Jefferson Airplane – in just the two short years since the release of the San Francisco collective's breakthrough smash Surrealistic Pillow. The countercultural movement had darkened, government involvement in Vietnam escalated, and regard for human rights fallen. Retreating from the excessive experimentalism that graced its prior two LPs, the Airplane responded to the social circumstances with defiant, assured, and cohesive songs shot through with driving psychedelia, crunchy acid-rock, and rustic country. From start to finish, it's the aural equivalent of a demonstration march.

Having drawn attention for the inclusion of profanities in multiple tunes, the Top 20 LP also ran up against the nonprofit Volunteers of America after the sextet wanted to title the record Volunteers of Amerika in order to express further dissatisfaction with the country. While Grace Slick and Co. gave into the charity's desires to switch the name, there's nothing compromising about Volunteers. Kaukonen's leads cut searing swaths through urgent fare like "Eskimo Blue Day" and anthemic "We Can Be Together," which boldly speaks out against convention and in favor of chaos and anarchy.

Indeed, in organizing a pseudo summit of many of the counterculture's leading musical figures to participate on Volunteers, the Airplane treats the album as an orchestrated stance against the establishment. Stills and Crosby assist in rocking the boat on a turbulent cover of "Wooden Ships" lined with Slick and Marty Balin's overlapping lead vocals. Hopkins gooses the call-to-arms title track with frisky boogie-woogie lines. Garcia lends "The Farm" a suitable rustic vibe, and on his final appearance with the Airplane, drummer Spencer Dryden helms the pastoral sing-a-long "A Song for All Seasons."

Ranked #370 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, Volunteers remains a cultural and musical touchstone. Experience it in the best sound it's ever enjoyed , and secure your lowest-numbered limited-edition copy

Jefferson Airplane Volunteers Track Listing:

1. We Can Be Together
2. Good Shepherd
3. The Farm
4. Hey Frederick
5. Turn My Life Down
6. Wooden Ships
7. Eskimo Blue Day
8. A Song for All Seasons
9. Meadowlands
10. Volunteers