higher than Volunteers, Blows Against the Empire and Hot Tuna's second album, First Pull Up, Then Pull Down, released three months before Bark in June. Despite the band's continued success, major creative and personal divisions persisted between the Slick-Kantner and Kaukonen-Casady factions. (Kaukonen's "Third Week In The Chelsea," from Bark, chronicles the thoughts he was having about leaving the band.) These problems continued to be exacerbated by the band's escalating cocaine use and Slick's alcohol use disorder. Consequently, while the band played several dates in August in support of Bark (including two concerts in the New York metropolitan area and a show apiece in Detroit and Philadelphia), no tour was planned. Following a private concert/party commemorating the formation of Grunt Records at San Francisco's Friends and Relations Hall in September, the band would not reconvene until several Midwestern engagements in January 1972. Jefferson Airplane held together long enough to record one more album, Long John Silver, begun in April 1972 and released in July. By this time the various members were thoroughly engaged with their various solo projects. Following the release of Kantner and Slick's Sunfighter in November 1971 and Creach's "eponymous solo debut" in December 1971, Hot Tuna released their first studio album and third opus Burgers in February 1972; meanwhile, Covington immersed himself in various Grunt Records projects, including his own solo album, Fat Fandango, released in 1973, and the sessions for Black Kangaroo's debut album led by multi-instrumentalist Peter Kaukonen, Jorma's younger brother. Covington was either dismissed from the band or left of his own volition shortly after the sessions commenced. With Hot Tuna drummer Sammy Piazza deputizing on one track, Covington (who had already recorded two drum parts) was soon replaced by former Turtles and CSNY drummer John Barbata, who ultimately played on most of the album. Barbata was recommended to the group by David Crosby. Long John Silver is notable for its cover, which folded out into a humidor, which the inner photo depicted as storing cigars (which may have been filled with marijuana). Despite middling reviews, the album rose to No. 20 in the United States, a significantly higher placement than Burgers (No. 68) or Sunfighter (No. 89). The band began a proper national tour to promote Long John Silver in 1972, their first in nearly two years. Shortly before the tour commenced, David Freiberg (who had recently completed a prison sentence for marijuana