Moonshot: Buffy's Passion Rocks
With Big Sound!

by Nicholas Bates

Moonshot doesn't have too much competition as the "Best Country Rock Album of the Seventies by a Native North American Woman" (and hey, the eighties and nineties, too)! Just what is so good about this record? For a start, it's the songs: masses of infectious hooks and memorable melodies. It was recorded in Nashville, and produced by Norbert Putnam and Buffy Sainte-Marie.

Buffy's singing is full-on and the production values verge on "Wall of Sound" meets rockin' country -- it's full of excitement and depth. Buffy's voice is just right for this full-on approach: deep, powerful and with more than a touch of vibrato. As with all of her best albums, the passionate nature of Sainte-Marie is never far from the surface, managing to turn even the seemingly benign "He's an Indian Cowboy at the Rodeo" into a political anthem. I guess how I really know Moonshot is such a great record is that I've consistently played it over the years, and never grown tired of it. Compared to her previous album, She Used to Wanna Be a Ballerina, Moonshot is just a much more consistent and inspired record -- an almost forgotten masterpiece which, if it were by Dylan or another male contemporary, it would be considered "classic" by now, and raved about.

It's great to know this record is available on CD. I hope that fans of the current generation of power girl popsters might explore this and other gems from a previous but still glorious era!