Paul Kantner, a founding member and singer-guitarist of rock band Jefferson Airplane, has died aged 74.
His death was confirmed by publicist and former girlfriend Cynthia Bowman, who said he died of multiple organ failure and septic shock.
Although the band was fronted by vocalists Grace Slick and Marty Balin, Kantner was considered a driving force. With songs like Somebody To Love and Volunteers, the San Francisco group helped pioneer the psychedelic sound. They formed in 1965 when folk artist Balin decided to create a rock group in response to the Beatles-led British Invasion.
Kantner, a college drop out who was already a familiar face on the San Francisco circuit, was the first person he approached.
"He was the first guy I picked for the band and he was the first guy who taught me how to roll a joint," Balin wrote on Facebook after learning his death. "And although I know he liked to play the devil's advocate, I am sure he has earned his wings now," he said.
The band advocated sex, psychedelic drugs, rebellion and a communal lifestyle, operating out of an eccentric house near Haight-Ashbury. The guitarist left in 1984, saying "the band became more mundane and not quite as challenging and not quite as much of a thing to be proud". He then took legal action against the remaining members, forcing them to truncate their name to Starship.
That incarnation of the group later had two global hit singles with Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now and We Built This City; while Kantner reformed and toured with various versions of Airplane, Starship and his own KBC band in the 1990s and 2000s.
