White Rabbit (song)

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"White Rabbit" is a psychedelic rock song from Jefferson Airplane's 1967 hit album Surrealistic Pillow, also released as a single, peaking at #8 on the Billboard Hot 100 in that form. First performed by composer Grace Slick with her band The Great Society during 1966, this striking song proved an inducement to convince members of the Airplane to lure Slick away to join them.

One of Slick's earliest songs, written in either late 1965 or early 1966, it details parallels between the hallucinatory effects of LSD and the imagery found in the work of Lewis Carroll. References to Carroll's 1865 fantasy Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its 1871 sequel Through the Looking-Glass pervade the song: the title character, the Dormouse, and the Red Queen. A century after the fact, Carroll was busy in the rock and roll world of 1967; that same year John Lennon would refer to Looking-Glass in his densely textured "I Am the Walrus" composition recorded by The Beatles, and Carroll has often been stated as an inspiration in the writing of Syd Barrett for the first Pink Floyd LP, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn.

From the Jefferson Airplane website: 'Grace has always said that White Rabbit was intended as a slap toward parents who read their children stories such as Alice in Wonderland (in which Alice uses several drug-like substances in order to change herself) and then wondered why their children grew up to do drugs. For Grace and others in the '60s, drugs were an inevitable part of mind-expanding and social experimentation. With its enigmatic lyrics, "White Rabbit" became one of the first songs to sneak drug references past censors on the radio. Even Marty Balin, Grace's eventual rival in the Airplane, regarded the song as a "masterpiece."'

Set to a rising crescendo similar to that of Ravel's famous Boléro, the music combined with the song's lyric strongly suggest the sensory distortions experienced with hallucinogens, the song later utilized in pop culture to imply or accompany just such a state. "White Rabbit" is one of two songs, along with "Somebody to Love," that Slick brought with her to Jefferson Airplane from her earlier group The Great Society when she replaced original Airplane vocalist Signe Anderson.

The song shares its bass line with later songs by The Jacksons ("Can You Feel It") and Madonna ("Material Girl").

Audio sample:

"White Rabbit" vs. "Can You Feel It" vs. "Material Girl" (file info) — play in browser (beta)
- Jefferson Airplane's "White Rabbit," The Jackson 5's "Can You Feel It" and "Material Girl" by Madonna.
Problems playing the files? See media help.

[edit] Cultural references

The drug-themed novel Go Ask Alice takes its name from the song, which includes the lyrics, "Go ask Alice/When she's ten feet tall." The book's protagonist is never named, but reviewers generally refer to her as "Alice" for the sake of convenience. The Columbia University health website Go Ask Alice!, however, does not take its name from the song.

Neo is told to follow the "White Rabbit" in the Matrix. One of many Matrix metaphysical "waking up" metaphors.

The song has been used twice on The Simpsons in episodes; "D'oh-in In the Wind," and Midnight Rx.

The song also features in the thriller The Game (1997) at a scene where the film's main protagonist is being subjected to extremely powerful psychological attacks on his sanity and sense of safety.

The character of Richard Nixon sings this song in the Futurama episode "A Head in the Polls," telling his audience, "I'm meeting you halfway, you stupid hippies!"

The song was mentioned in Hunter S. Thompson's book Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas in the memorable scene in which Dr. Gonzo (the attorney) asks Thompson to throw the tape deck into the bath with him during a bad acid trip:

""White Rabbit." I need rising sound … And when it comes to that fantastic note where the rabbit bites its own head off, I want you to throw that fuckin' radio into the tub with me!"

The song was also featured in Oliver Stone's Platoon; it is played in the background of the "Feel Good Cave" as the soldiers are getting high. It also forms the main menu music of the PC game Battlefield Vietnam.

More recently, the song was used on an episode of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Jay Leno talked about a town that has baseball "the way it used to be"; the hometown of that team is known for smoking cannabis, and this song played when they showed people in a park smoking.

In 2005 the song was used on C.R.A.Z.Y., a film directed by Jean-Marc Vallée.

Also in 2005 "White Rabbit" was featured in a delicate drug-related scene in Atom Egoyan's movie Where The Truth Lies, starring Kevin Bacon, Colin Firth, and Alison Lohman.

A "White Rabbit" cover portion has been a consistent part of Blue Man Group shows since their inception, and was released on their 2003 album "The Complex" featuring the vocal talent of Esthero

The song was played during an episode of HBO's The Sopranos. During a scene when Tony Soprano is struggling with taking more Prozac for his Panic Attacks.

A commercial for the video game Red Faction 2 used this song as well.

In the movie Stoned from 2005 the song is played when the character of Brian Jones takes LSD for the first time.

The song is played during a drug-related skit on an episode of The Daily Show.

A commercial for No.7 make up, used the song as well.

[edit] Covers

The song was covered in the following years:

1971 – by the jazz guitarist George Benson
1980 – by the punk band The Last Words
1980 – by the punk / gothic rock band The Damned [1]
1981 – by the post punk band The Mo-Dettes in a Peel Session
1985 – by the hardcore punk band Ruin...[2]for their White Rabbit promotional cassette and later (1986) included in their Fiat Lux Album [3]
1987 – by the metal band Sanctuary
1987 – by the rock band Act
1989 – by the hardcore punk band Slapshot
1990 – by the house music duo David Diebold & Kim Cataluna [4]
1995 – by The Murmurs (MCA Records)
1996 – by the Icelandic singer-songwriter Emilíana Torrini
1996 – by the Norwegian Heavy Metal Band In The Woods for their White Rabbit EP and later (2000) included in their Three Times Seven On A Pilgrimage Album [5]
2001 – by the industrial band Collide [6]
2004 – by the performance art / experimental rock group Blue Man Group with vocals by Esthero [7]
2006 – remixed by the psychedelic trance act Fuzzion as Little Girl on the album Black Magic [8]
2006 – by the Brechtian punk cabaret duo The Dresden Dolls at the Bonnaroo Music Festival
2006 – by The Cadets Drum and Bugle Corps in their show "Volume 2: Through The Looking Glass."