Moon Is Up

Composers: Mick Jagger & Keith Richards
Recording date: September 1993, November 1993-April 1994
Recording locations: Sandymount Studios, Ron Wood's home, St. Kildare, Ireland; Windmill Lane
Recording, Dublin, Ireland; & A&M Recording Studios, Los Angeles, USA
Producers: Don Was & The Glimmer Twins        Chief engineer: Don Smith
Performed onstage: 1999

Line-up:

Drums: Charlie Watts
Acoustic bass: Darryl Jones
Acoustic & electric guitars: Keith Richards
Pedal steel guitar: Ron Wood
Lead vocal: Mick Jagger
Background vocals: Bernard Fowler & Bobby Womack
Harmonium: Chuck Leavell
Accordian air whoosh: Benmont Tench
Harmonica: Mick Jagger
Castanets: Mick Jagger
 

Ha ha ha

The moon is up, the sun is down
You can't have it both ways round
Mm baby, won't you listen to me?
We are worlds apart, you see

Mmm, where are you now?
Mmm, crying out loud

Where did you go
When I needed you?

Mmm mm-mm-mm-mm

The sun sinks behind the clouds
And hides his tears without a sound
The moon looks on reflectively
So spare a thought for you and me

Mmm, where are you now?
Mmm, dark are the clouds

Where did you go
When I needed you?

Tell me

The moon is up, the sky is black
I'll sail away and won't come back
The sun goes down, the stars will rise
And dance across the darkened skies

Mm, the sun goes down
The moon comes up

The moon is up, the sun goes down
And you can't have it both ways round
So come on, baby, and listen to me
Cause we are worlds apart, you see

Mmm

The sun goes down   (ooh yeah...)
The moon comes up
The sun goes down


 

TrackTalk

That song had been around since Ireland, and everybody was fascinated with it. The song was suddenly there, you know, and what are we going to do with it? To me, it was all tied in with Charlie. If Charlie Watts is willing to experiment in the studio, then I'm the happiest man in the world. It so happened that as we were trying this track out in different configurations, I put an acoustic guitar through a Leslie cabinet, Ronnie was playing pedal steel through some tiny little amplifier, and Mick was singing through the harp mike. The drums were the only thing that sounded unreal, because they were real. So we fished around for a bit, and I said, Well, what about playing on a suitcase outside? And before I know it, Charlie Watts is out there in the stairwell with a garbage can and brushes, and that's the sound. After that, it was very hard to keep him out of the stairwell.

- Keith Richards, June 1994


I play a trash can in the stairwell on Moon Is Up.  It's a 4-flight stairwell, and I started off at the top, which is Moon Is Up, and I ended up at the bottom playing You Got Me Rocking and Thru and Thru...

- Charlie Watts, June 1994


We've often done things like that, in loos (bathrooms) or corridors. It's easier to do that than to do it with echo chambers, you know? It's sometimes not so good for an engineer, 'cause you've got this sound and you can't get rid of it. Whereas if you record it dry you can always add things. But this was good.

- Charlie Watts, 1994


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