Drummers have often been regarded as lowly figures on the rock'n'roll totem pole, but Spencer Dryden, who has died of cancer aged 66, exerted a powerful influence on the Jefferson Airplane after he joined the band in San Francisco in 1966. Forming an alliance, both personal and professional, with singer Grace Slick, Dryden was able to shape the Airplane's musical direction and business decisions; for instance, he threatened to quit in 1968 if the group did not sack manager Bill Graham. Graham was duly dismissed.
Although his abrasive personality regularly caused problems, Dryden proved to be a shrewd choice musically. The Airplane's music incorporated elements of folk, rock and free-form experimentation, and Dryden's background as a jazz drummer, who had played in various Los Angeles clubs, meant he had acquired the appropriate skills, even if joining an amplified rock band meant him developing a more muscular approach. The bolero beat which Dryden added to the Airplane's classic hit, White Rabbit, was one example of his musical breadth, and though not a prolific writer, he contributed the mysterious electronic pieces A Small Package Of Value Will Come To You Shortly and Chushingura to the group's recorded repertoire.
Born in New York City, Dryden instantly became accustomed to the exotic air of showbusiness, since his father, Wheeler Dryden, was a British actor working on Broadway, and his mother Alice was a ballet dancer at Radio City Music Hall. Spencer always kept quiet about the fact that his father was Charlie Chaplin's half brother, wanting to be recognised for his own achievements rather than basking in reflected glory. The family moved to Los Angeles when he was one year old, and after his parents' divorce, his father would frequently take him down to the Chaplin movie lots to watch works in progress.
His father also took him to hear jazz musicians, and Spencer proved such an eager student that by the age of 16 he was competent enough to sit in with jazz bands onstage. However, the tumultuous arrival of rock'n'roll meant that jazz was becoming an increasingly precarious way to earn a living, so Dryden signed up with a rock band called the Ashes. The big breakthrough did not occur, so Dryden picked up extra cash by playing drums in LA strip clubs such as Interlude and the Pink Pussycat. It was at the latter that he met his first wife Jeanne Davis, aka "Athena the Grecian Goddess".
He travelled north to San Francisco after receiving a phone call from the Jefferson Airplane's then manager, Matthew Katz, in May 1966. There were so many bands starting up in the San Francisco area that Katz could not find a drummer locally. Dryden was taken aback by the communal hippy lifestyle he found in San Francisco, but immediately felt he belonged. "There was a vibe going on, a lot of energy," he recalled. "I was the right choice for the band - it was a good match-up."
Dryden stayed with the Airplane during their most successful and creative period. He appeared with them at both the Woodstock and Altamont festivals, and finally left after they had recorded the politically outspoken Volunteers album in 1969. His departure coincided with his marriage to second wife and Airplane groupie Sally Mann, after his relationship with Grace Slick had fizzled out. He and Mann divorced in 1973.
He went on to play with so-called "psychedelic cowboys" New Riders Of The Purple Sage, an offshoot of the Grateful Dead, with whom he stayed until 1978, becoming their manager in the process. His profile was never so high again, though he put in stints behind the drumkit with the Dinosaurs, an ensemble of Bay Area veterans from such bands as Quicksilver Messenger Service and Country Joe & The Fish, and its offshoot Fish & Chips. He retired from drumming in 1995.
Dryden and Jefferson Airplane were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame in New York in 1996, but the final decade of his life became a depressing saga of personal problems. In September 2003, his home in Petaluma, California, burned down, and most of his possessions and career memorabilia were destroyed. A batch of musician friends staged a benefit concert for him in May 2004, when Dryden was facing a second hip replacement operation and heart surgery, and had just been diagnosed with the stomach cancer which eventually killed him.
He is survived by his sons Jeffery, Jesse and Jackson.
· Spencer Dryden, drummer, born July 4 1938; died January 11 2005