Jefferson Starship’s 1975 single “Miracles” climbed to No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and became the band’s highest-charting song, even though some of the people in the room were not convinced it should be released. The track, written by Marty Balin, went from a song the band did not especially trust to the one that defined its commercial peak.

That is why listeners still search for the song now: it was not just a hit, it was the hit that changed Jefferson Starship’s place on the chart. Released from Red Octopus, “Miracles” helped push the album to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 200 on Sept. 6, 1975, where it stayed for four weeks. For the band, Balin’s ballad did more than land on the radio. It helped turn Red Octopus into Jefferson Starship’s only No. 1 album.

Balin said in 2018 that he wrote “Miracles” with Sathya Sai Baba in mind. He said he had heard Indian chanting and singing linked to the spiritual figure from India, then began reading Persian poetry while thinking about the song’s language and feeling. In his telling, the song grew out of that mix of devotional imagery and romantic phrasing, with Balin working toward something intimate and spiritual at the same time.

The striking part is how little enthusiasm it got at first. Balin said he was worried because nobody liked it, and the other members of Jefferson Starship were not huge fans when they first heard it. One remembered reaction captured the skepticism plainly: “Everybody went, ‘I don’t know about that. That’s pretty weird, man.’” The same song that sounded strange in the rehearsal room ended up becoming the band’s biggest hit.

That contradiction is what gives “Miracles” its staying power. Jefferson Starship later found even more chart success as Starship, but “Miracles” remained the group’s highest-charting single and the clearest proof that the band’s instincts were wrong the first time around. Balin wondered if the skeptics might be wrong. The chart answered that question for him long ago.