Moonshake (song)

"Moonshake" is a song by the krautrock band Can, released as a single, alongside the "Future Days" as the B-side, on their 1973 album Future Days.^[3]

"Moonshake"
Song by Can
from the album Future Days
B-side	"Future Days"
Released	Late 1973
Studio	Inner Space Studio [de] (Weilerswist, West Germany)
Genre	Psychedelic pop[1] funk[2] reggae[2]
Length	3:04
Label	United Artists Spoon
Producer(s)	Can
Official audio
"Moonshake" on YouTube

Composition

Rob Young, Can's biographer, compared "Moonshake" to the rest of "Can catalogue of perfectly formed pop songs". Similar to the song "She Brings the Rain" from Soundtracks and "Sing Swan Song" from Ege Bamyasi, it introduces "elements of rock convention and erasing any sense of cliché around them".^[4] Additionally, "Moonshake" is the only track on the album that shifts into the Motorik rhythm, propagated by the band on their previous albums.^[5][6]

Reception and legacy

John Peel, reviewing the single for Sounds, described it as "less than promising" but overall feeling that "it's great", although its chances to become a hit were "roughly comparable to his chances of being asked to join Ivy Benson's All-Girl Orchestra on harp".^[7]

In 2017 Vice's Drew Millard described "Moonshake" as "pre-punk-post-punk sugar rush", relieving "all the meandering that comes before it" and slipping away just as it begins.^[5]

Can incorporated the melody of "Moonshake" into "Don't Say No", the first song from their 1977 album Saw Delight.^[8] The British-based experimental rock/post-rock band, Moonshake, takes its name from this song.^[9][10]

Personnel

(From album credits)

• Holger Czukay – bass guitar, double bass
• Michael Karoli – electric guitar, violin
• Jaki Liebezeit – drums, percussion, "melodica-type instrument"^[4]
• Irmin Schmidt – Farfisa organ and electric piano, electronics^[11]
• Damo Suzuki – vocals, percussion