Janis Lyn Joplin (January 19, 1943 - October 4, 1970) was an American singer, songwriter, and music arranger, from Port Arthur, Texas. She rose to prominence in the late 1960s as the lead singer of Big Brother and the Holding Company, and later as a solo artist. In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked Joplin number 46 on its list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time, and number 28 on its 2008 list of 100 Greatest Singers of All Time.

Jefferson Starship is an American rock band that was popular in the 1970s and 1980s. It evolved from a science fiction-themed Paul Kantner concept album entitled Blows Against the Empire.

Big Brother and the Holding Company is an American rock band that formed in San Francisco in 1965 as part of the same psychedelic music scene that produced the Grateful Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Service and Jefferson Airplane. They are best known as the band that featured Janis Joplin as their lead singer. Their 1968 album Cheap Thrills is considered one of the masterpieces of the psychedelic sound of San Francisco; it reached number one on the Billboard charts, and was ranked number 338 in Rolling Stone's the 500 greatest albums of all time.

Paul Lorin Kantner (born March 17, 1941 in San Francisco, California) is an American rock musician, most noted for co-founding the psychedelic rock band Jefferson Airplane.

David Freiberg (born August 24, 1938, Cincinnati, Ohio) is an American musician. He was vocalist and bass guitar player with Quicksilver Messenger Service, Jefferson Airplane and Jefferson Starship.

Mark "Slick" Aguilar (born 1954 in Florida) is an American guitarist. He has worked with a number of notable musicians but is probably best known as a member of Jefferson Starship.He played guitar with KC & the Sunshine Band and Wayne Cochran during the late 1970s before moving to the West Coast. It was there that he joined Buddy Miles' band and in 1982 he toured with David Crosby. In 1984 Slick joined Marty Balin's band which led to him being hired to play lead guitar in the KBC Band. When Paul Kantner reformed Jefferson Starship in 1992 he hired Slick to play lead guitar and he is still in the band as of 2008. He also sometimes performs with Marty Balin as a duo.

Donny Baldwin is an American drummer best known as a member of Jefferson Starship and its continuation Starship. Donny began his career as a drummer for Elvin Bishop during the 1970s where he worked with future Jefferson Starship bandmate Mickey Thomas. When Aynsley Dunbar left Jefferson Starship in 1982 Donny joined the band and first recorded with the band in the studio on Nuclear Furniture. He remained with Starship until their final studio album, Love Among the Cannibals. In 1990, he assaulted Mickey Thomas and broke his face. Thomas required reconstructive surgery and Baldwin was fired from Starship for the incident. From 1994 until its demise in 1995 Baldwin drummed for the Jerry Garcia Band. He rejoined the reformed Jefferson Starship in 2008, replacing Prairie Prince and will be performing on their tour to support the 2008 studio album Jefferson's Tree of Liberty. By coincidence, both times Donny joined Jefferson Starship he replaced a former Journey drummer. He is now drumming for Lydia Pense as a member of Cold Blood.

Marty Balin (born Martyn Jerel Buchwald, January 30, 1943, in Cincinnati, Ohio) is an American musician. He is best known as the founder and one of the lead singers of Jefferson Airplane, the pioneering rock band from San Francisco. Born and raised in Ohio, Marty suffered from a mild form of autism as a child that he struggled with growing up. It would affect him into his adulthood as well. During his late teens, Martyn became interested in being an artist and musician. In 1962, Martyn renamed himself Marty Balin and began recording with Challenge Records, releasing the singles "Nobody But You" and "I Specialize in Love". They garnered little attention, so he went to work with his father and got married. His interest in music did not wane and by 1963-64, Balin was leading a folk music quartet called The Town Criers, with fellow band members Larry Vargo, Jan Ellickson and Bill Collins. Balin was the founder and a featured vocalist for Jefferson Airplane from 1965 to 1971. He appeared with the group during their performances at Monterey and Woodstock in 1967 and 1969, and less successfully at the disastrous Altamont Speedway concert, where he was knocked unconscious by a biker from the Hells Angels motorcycle club .In 1971, he departed Jefferson Airplane, recording an album under the group name Bodacious D.F. in 1973, producing an album for the group Grootna, and contributing one song, "Caroline", to Dragon Fly from Jefferson Airplane's followup group, Jefferson Starship. Marty joined Jefferson Starship permanently in 1975. In late 1978, after several major hits with Starship, Balin left the group.In 1979, he produced a rock opera entitled "Rock Justice," about a rock-star who was put in jail for failing to produce a hit for the record company. The cast recording, produced by Balin, but not featuring him in performance, was released on EMI America. EMI then approached him about doing a solo album of his own.In 1981, he released his first solo album, Balin, featuring two Top 40 hits, "Hearts" and "Atlanta Lady." This was followed in 1983 by a second solo album, Lucky, along with a Japanese-only EP called There's No Shoulder. Lucky did not match the performance of Balin on the Billboard charts, and Balin's contract with EMI ended.In 1985, he teamed up with Paul Kantner and Jack Casady to form the KBC Band. After the breakup of the KBC band, a 1989 reunion album and tour with Jefferson Airplane followed. Balin recorded his third solo album in 1991 for GWE Records, Better Generation.In 1993 Balin reunited with Kantner in Jefferson Starship - The Next Generation, and in 1997 he recorded a fourth solo album for Solid Discs, Freedom Flight.In 1999, Balin recorded the cover album Marty Balin Greatest Hits with Jefferson Starship guitarist Slick Aguilar and other musicians not associated with the band. It was the last studio album he recorded with a record label. Balin recorded two more studio albums and released them on his own, selling them on his website and Jefferson Starship's website using the imprint "JB Records".He is also an accomplished painter.As of 2008 Balin continues to perform part-time with Jefferson Starship and had intended to record lead vocals for two tracks for their latest album, Jefferson's Tree of Liberty. However, his art touring schedule conflicted with studio sessions and instead the track "Maybe for You" from the German release of Windows of Heaven was included.On July 2, 2007, music publishing firm Bicycle Music, Inc. announced that it acquired an interest in more than 70 songs written or performed by Balin, including hits from his days with Jefferson Airplane and Jefferson Starship.

Grace Slick (born Grace Barnett Wing on October 30, 1939) is an American singer and songwriter, who was one of the lead singers of the rock groups The Great Society, Jefferson Airplane, Jefferson Starship, and Starship, and as a solo artist, for nearly three decades, from the mid-1960s to the mid-1990s. Slick was an important figure in the 1960s psychedelic rock genre, and is known for her witty, often acid-tongued, thought-provoking lyrics and powerful contralto vocals.

Jefferson Airplane was an American rock band formed in San Francisco in 1965. A pioneer of the psychedelic rock movement, Jefferson Airplane was the first band from the San Francisco scene to achieve mainstream commercial and critical success. Throughout the late 1960s Jefferson Airplane was one of the most sought-after and highly-paid concert acts in the world. Their recordings were internationally successful and sold in great quantities, and they scored two US Top 10 hit singles and a string of Top 20 albums. Their 1967 record Surrealistic Pillow is still widely regarded as one of the key recordings of the so-called Summer of Love period and brought the group international recognition. Successor bands to Jefferson Airplane include Jefferson Starship and Starship while spinoffs include Hot Tuna and KBC Band. Jefferson Airplane was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996.

Signe Toly Anderson (born 15 September 1941 in Seattle, Washington) is a singer who was one of the founding members of the American rock band Jefferson Airplane.

The KBC Band was formed in 1985 by former Jefferson Airplane (later Jefferson Starship) members Paul Kantner, Marty Balin and Jack Casady . Other members included Keith Crossan, Tim Gorman, Mark 'Slick' Aguilar and Darrell Verdusco . Their debut LP, "KBC Band", featured the moderate hits "America", which found renewed interest after the September 11, 2001 attacks, and "It's Not You, It's Not Me", which attracted airplay on AOR radio. The band performed supporting tours from 1985 -- 1987 before Kantner left for Nicaragua to investigate the Sandinista situation. The band did not perform after his return. Kantner and Casady called a band meeting and told Balin the band was breaking up, but did not inform Balin of the reason. Kantner has said that Marty becomes difficult sometimes and was becoming difficult near the end of KBC's existence. However, Kantner and Casady continued to perform onstage together during Hot Tuna concerts in late 1987 and early 1988, and the three did re-unite with Grace Slick and Jorma Kaukonen for a Jefferson Airplane reunion album and a reunion tour in 1989, along with Tim Gorman playing keyboards for the tour. After Jefferson Airplane broke up again, Kantner, Aguilar, and Gorman formed a new band, Jefferson Starship - The Next Generation, which Casady and Balin would join once again. As of 2008, Verdusco is a member of Starship featuring Mickey Thomas.

The Gone Jackals was a hard rock and roll band, based in San Francisco, California. They gained some fame among computer gamers worldwide when they provided parts of the soundtrack to the biker themed adventure-game Full Throttle by LucasArts . The soundtrack became LucasArts best selling item in their mail order catalog. In late 2001, Keith Karloff, frontman of the band, started working on a new musical project. Led by his great passion for the old style rock music, he formed The Bonedrivers, a blues rock power trio which has since then toured the U.S.A. and published a locally acclaimed full-length album named Roadhouse Manifesto.

John Michael Thomas, better known as Mickey Thomas (born December 3, 1949, in Cairo, Georgia), is an American singer.He was inspired to take part in music after seeing a Beatles performance in 1964. He travelled to Atlanta with long time childhood friends Charles Connell, Lewis Oliver, Tommy Verran and Walter Wight. Thomas, Connell and Verran wound up in their first rock and roll band together. Ironically, Verran was the lead singer at the time. They split up to go to different colleges, but later reformed in the early 1970s along with friend Bud Thomas as "The Jets". While singing lead for The Jets, in 1974, Thomas joined the Elvin Bishop Group as a harmony singer, and eventually made it to lead vocals. His best-known achievement was singing on Elvin Bishop's chart hit "Fooled Around And Fell In Love", a #3 single in 1976. Mickey Thomas recorded a solo album, As Long as You Love Me, in 1976.In early 1979 Mickey Thomas was asked to join Jefferson Starship after the departure of Marty Balin and Grace Slick. In 1981, Mickey Thomas recorded a second solo album, Alive Alone. Two years later, one of Thomas's former bandmates in the Elvin Bishop Group, drummer Donny Baldwin, became Starship's new drummer when Aynsley Dunbar left.He spent most of the early eighties as the main vocalist of Jefferson Starship, performing several duets with Slick and gaining greater influence in the band. After Paul Kantner left in 1984, Thomas was sole leader of the band. From 1985 - 1989 the newly dubbed "Starship" scored some of its biggest hits. When Grace Slick left again in 1988, Thomas sang all lead vocals - in a band that was formed when he was just 15 years old. But, their fortunes as pop music artists soon ran out. A tour was cancelled after Thomas was attacked in a bar and required facial reconstruction surgery. He has also appeared in the 1989 film Dream a Little Dream as well as having recorded the film's titled theme song and its duet version with Mel Tormé for the soundtrack. The duet version was also played during the end of the film. The original incarnation of Starship disbanded in 1991. In 1992 Paul Kantner reformed Jefferson Starship without Thomas and Thomas formed a new touring band called "Starship featuring Mickey Thomas"; touring has continued with this title. In 1998 he guested on Sammy Hagar's album, Marching To Mars.In 2002, Thomas and his touring band re-recorded all of the Jefferson Starship hits on which he had appeared. The resulting album was released in 2003, without any band credits being provided, as Forever Gold, part of a series of releases by St. Clair Entertainment.In 2004, he released an album project, under the title of Over the Edge, produced by Fabrizio Grossi. In 2008, Thomas recorded a new album with Aynsley Dunbar for Direct Music featuring artists such as Jake E. Lee, former guitarist for Ozzy Osbourne. Thomas will reunite with Elvin Bishop as Starship will close for them in late 2008. A new Mickey Thomas Starship album is due out spring 2009.

Aynsley Thomas Dunbar (born 10 January 1946, in Liverpool, England) is an English drummer. He has worked with some of the top names in rock and roll, including John Mayall, Frank Zappa, Ian Hunter, Lou Reed, Jefferson Starship, Jeff Beck, David Bowie, Whitesnake, Sammy Hagar, UFO, and Journey.