Day 299: Mountains Of The Moon, 4/26/69

I always assumed that Mountains of the Moon referred to the topography of the celestial body. I randomly did a google search on “Mountains of the Moon” and good ole Wikipedia tells me there are actual landforms in Africa known by this name.

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Apparently these are the mountains near the source of the Nile River. There was even a film released in 1990 by the same title about explorers in the 1850s seeking the source of the Nile.

This connection to ancient Africa adds a really fascinating layer to the Grateful Dead song Mountains of the Moon. It already has that Medieval/Renaissance minstrel-esque vibe to it, but this connection provides another layer of antiquity to contend with. Given that this song was written in the late 1960s I always made the defacto connection to the space race of that time and the idea of space, combined with psychedelia just made sense. Perhaps that’s still true, but another terrestrial connection makes the song even cooler in my book and provides an entirely new set of mental images to accompany the music.

Jerry’s vocal and acoustic guitar are highest in the mix here, but there is plenty going on in the back ground too. It’s worth noting that Jerry’s singing is really beautiful here and he delivers this Renaissance- or baroque-esque song with appropriate aplomb. This is another straightforward song with little need for improvisation. Jerry does play a brief acoustic solo, but by and large the song sticks to it’s basic structure. Right around the five minute mark Jerry bangs out some chords that have a UJB quality to them. The lull occurs when Jerry switches to electric and soon the song starts to get really interesting. There’s a bit of that UJB rhythmic feel all the way to the end, which is marked by a transition to China Cat Sunflower.