SHAWN PHILLIPS Fans talk about Moonshine
  ...Moonshine to me has always seemed like a depiction of a nuclear fallout/devastation---and rebirth.  Read through it again with that in mind and see what you think.  It's all there from the polluted water to the darkness in the sky, to the reasons for the war, to the bomb shelters/with commodities, to the sunshine and laughter coming after!! Pat
.......I'm imagining it might have been in that phase when Shawn wrote this song I read that he wrote most of his songs back then in the middle of the night). So he's writing along all this stuff about the state of the world and politics and all, and he looks up and see's the moon and writes about it. "Whoaa Moonshine" Then as morning dawns .... "and the sunshine, whoaa sunshine, sunshine comin gonna be another brand new day....... Done writing the song -- time to go to bed.....  Linda
..I first thought it had to do with the war in Nam. But I've of late begun to see it is about the conflict inside myself and my struggle to find my true identity. Not listening to others try to tell me who I am, not falling for the safety of the norm, but looking deeper within myself. And knowing that there is always another day. As long as I'm looking there will be another day...John

 

...the song Moonshine is about how sincere, idealist people wish to fight for what they believe in, but actually only pay lip service to their causes, and the ones doing the actual fighting don't believe in the causes they fight for, but are merely fulfilling their gruesome primal needs and aggressions. A bleak portrait of the "establishment" and us too, if we don't stop and think and CHANGE things. The state of the world today is more at risk than ever, and the problems even more complex and confusing........Gloria
wilting flowers....couldn't stay...
Madness, violence, the futile attempt to soothe jagged nerves with material things. Warning sings whipping past the window as we race to who knows what end But, one person gazes up, inquiring towards the star filled heavens, and understands as he wathches a moon encircled by a halo of ice crystals that yes, there is a storm coming, probaly a big one. One that may change everything.......one that may stop us, everyone, in our tracks. And there's a slight chance that when the rumble, and gale have ceased,......we may take stock of what's left and who's standing, and who needs help......and we might, just might determine to slow down, heed the warnings of the future, and decide to love and really live. After all,......there's gonna be another brand new day.......David
 

When Shawn is obviously having a good time during a concert and performs
this song, he seems to morph into an old blues singer (I've talked about this in my writeup of one of the Cactus Cafe shows........ He gets that left foot bangin' the floor and shapes his mouth like some toothless old-timer, and you'd swear he's picturing himself as a street-corner blues singer. I see this as a song about each individual's personal journey--our internal, spiritual travels....Leonard

When mankind realizes he creates his reality, and takes responsibility for it; he will see the light. Spread Eagle

 

Words are words however...
reality is much more an "in and out the garbage pail experience"
reality is fickle...
but we keep getting pulled back to the light....
Shawn makes many references to that interplay between the dark and the light... that relative relationship necessary for either to exist... ?
In moonshine, after the storm we have greater need for the light... MaryAnn

 
   
 
 

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