John Barbata, the traditional rock drummer who performed on period-defining documents by the Turtles, Jefferson Airplane and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, has died. He was 79.
Jefferson Plane (and its offshoot Jefferson Starship) confirmed Barbata’s dying in formal posts on their social media accounts. A full checklist of survivors and exact date of death were being not immediately readily available.
Barbata was “known for his outstanding talent,” Jefferson Airplane wrote in its statement asserting his death. “Back in ‘72, in the course of a hiatus for CSN&Y, David Crosby released John to the Plane, who employed John instantly. You can listen to John’s drumming capabilities on the band’s last studio album, ‘Long John Silver,’ as effectively as the live album ‘Thirty Seconds In excess of Winterland.’”
Barbata, born in New Jersey, moved to Southern California as a teenager, taking part in in surf-rock bands — he was a member of the Sentinels, whose “La Tinia” was a nearby radio strike in 1961 — just before joining the Turtles, then using high right after their 1965 protect of “It Ain’t Me Babe.” Barbata recorded on their chart-topper and defining monitor “Happy Together” and the adhere to-up smash “She’d Instead Be With Me.”
Barbata stayed with the team via their remaining three albums, 1967’s “Happy Jointly,” 1968’s “The Turtles Existing the Battle of the Bands” and 1969’s “Turtle Soup.” In his memoir, he recalled a wild London journey exactly where he partied with John Lennon, Paul McCartney and the Rolling Stones’ Brian Jones, a night time that went sideways when a Turtles roadie spilled a pitcher of beer on Lennon.
Soon after the Turtles broke up, Barbata joined CSNY for a operate of tour dates that ended up documented on the stay album “4 Way Road,” wherever he performed drums on Neil Young‘s “Ohio,” prepared in the wake of the Kent State campus shootings.
When that group went on hiatus, Barbata executed on numerous of its members’ solo albums, which include Young’s “Time Fades Away,” Graham Nash’s “Songs for Beginners” and Stephen Stills’ 1970 self-titled file. (Barbata also famously performed a 45-moment drum solo to avoid a riot when 1969’s Atlanta Pop Pageant endured a power outage.)
David Crosby recruited him to be part of the last Jefferson Plane lineup, and the band later introduced him into Jefferson Starship, exactly where he performed on hits like “Miracles” over 4 LPs: 1974’s “Dragon Fly,” 1975’s “Red Octopus”, 1976’s “Spitfire” and 1978’s “Earth.”
Along the way, he recorded and toured with Linda Ronstadt, Joni Mitchell, Leon Russell, Medical doctor John, the Everly Brothers and several a lot more. Barbata, as he recounts in his memoir, declined both equally an opportunity to drum for Elvis Presley and a possibility to be a part of the Eagles, telling the Phoenix New Occasions that “[David] Geffen walked above to me and claimed, ‘There is a new team forming, and they want you to be part of it. They are referred to as the Eagles.’ I reported, ‘Who the hell are the Eagles? I by no means heard of them.”
A 1978 automobile accident and lengthy recovery necessitated his departure from Jefferson Starship, and he mainly remaining the new music marketplace afterward. Barbata published a memoir, “The Famous Lifetime of a Rock Star Drummer,” in 2005. He ultimately moved to southern Oklahoma, wherever he used his final many years.
“It was a wild ride, and a single that I’m glad I had the possibility to knowledge,” Barbata explained to the Oklahoman in 2005. “It was an knowledge, and 1 that authorized me to make a great deal of revenue carrying out what I appreciate to do: make new music and perform. I met a great deal of wonderful persons, realized a large amount of really hard classes and ultimately met the girl of my desires.
“What extra could a guy from New Jersey inquire for?”
