Best Moon Songs written on Earth Vol. 1 (30 Tracks)

1. Pink Moon - Nick Drake

The Nick Drake song Pink Moon from his studio album of the same name was recorded at the end of 1971 and is the first track on the album of the same name. In 1999, the song was used for a commercial for a German automobile manufacturer's convertible.

2. My Moon My Man - Feist

The lyrics of My Moon My Man by Canadian singer-songwriter Feist are about her relationship with the moon. One can conclude - but that is pure speculation - that the moon is a metaphorical comparison for a relationship with her husband. The song title already says My Moon My Man. In the lyrics, Feist uses the linguistic stylistic device oxymoron (contradiction in itself), which means: the dirtiest cleaning.

3. The Killing Moon - Echo & The Bunnymen

The 1984 song The Killing Moon by the British post-punk band Echo & The Bunnymen has a deep meaning and can by no means be deciphered by a song analysis, no matter how complex. For the band's singer Ian McCulloch, the song is "(...) about everything (...) it contains the answer to the meaning of life. (...)"^[1]

4. Walking On The Moon - The Police

Originally, the song had absolutely nothing to do with the moon. The song title was initially 'Walking Round The Room' when Sting, the singer and bassist of the British band The Police, was wandering around drunk in a Munich hotel room, came up with a riff for the song and sang 'Walking round the room, ya, ya, walking round the room' to it. According to Sting, the song title 'Walking Round The Room' wasn't stupid enough for him, so he switched to the even more stupid title Walking On The Moon.^[2]

5. Man On The Moon - R.E.M.

The R.E.M. song Man On The Moon is a tribute to one of the most popular American comedians, or rather performance artists, of the 1970s. But what do the moon and Elvis Presley in the lyrics have to do with Andy Kaufman? Just as there were rumors about the death of Elvis Presley that Elvis may not have died in 1977 but was still alive afterwards, there were rumors that Andy Kaufmann did not die in 1984 but lived on. Finally, the moon, or more precisely the moon landing, is a link to the deaths of Elvis and Andy Kaufman, because there were also claims by conspiracy theorists that NASA landings on the moon did not happen. Conspiracy theories claimed that the moon landings between 1969 and 1972 were faked by NASA. An Institute of Physics article states that every single argument claiming that NASA faked the moon landings has been debunked.^[3]

6. Full Moon - Brandy

The song Full Moon by American singer-songwriter Brandy is about how in a club, the protagonist and someone she hasn't seen there before are very attracted to each other. It must be a special night, which leads to the conclusion, as the lyrics say, that this night is probably a full moon. The 2002 track is the second single from her album of the same name.

7. Full Moon - The Black Ghosts

The song Full Moon by the English music duo The Black Ghosts is the 3rd track on the official soundtrack to the 2008 American film Twilight. The lyrics of Full Moon are thematically linked to the content of the film. In addition to the female lead Stella (played by Kirsten Stewart), the male lead Edward Cullen (played by Robert Pattionson) has a direct connection to the full moon, as he is a vampire.

8. To The Moon & Back - Savage Garden

On the alternative album cover (1998 re-release cover) of the 1996 single To the Moon and Back by the Australian pop duo Savage Garden, the two members Darren Hayes and Daniel Jones are featured in the foreground. The earth and the moon are visible in the background from a space perspective.
The track was one of the duo's most successful singles.

9. Harvest Moon - Neil Young

With over 100 million views, the music video for the Neil Young song Harvest Moon is the most popular on his official YouTube channel.
The music video plays in the evening until late at night and the full moon appears several times when the night sky is clear. The video shows Neil Young playing a double role in a music bar with a large dance floor in the countryside, dancing with a woman and performing with his band at the same time. Later, a flashback shows him as a young man dancing with his girlfriend in this music bar.

10. Space Oddity - David Bowie

The David Bowie song Space Oddity was released as quickly as possible on July 11, 1969, so that the release date of the single would be before the moon landing of Apollo 11.
After breaking up with his girlfriend at the time, Bowie found inspiration for the song in the Stanley Kubrick movie 2001: A Space Oddissey. David Bowie had seen the science fiction classic from 1968 three times in the cinema by this time.^[4]

11. Thriller - Michael Jackson

The second and third lines of the lyrics to Michael Jackson's song Thriller from 1983 are "and something evil's lurking in the dark under the moonlight". The music video was directed by the American movie director John Landis. The music video lasts almost 14 minutes.

12. Moon - Kid Francescoli

The music project Kid Francescoli consists of the American Julia Minkin from Chicago and the Frenchman Mathieu Hocine from Marseille. The video for the song Moon, which was published on YouTube in 2017, now has almost 100 million views.

13. Moon River - Henry Mancini

Moon River is a famous movie song (Breakfast at Tiffany's from 1961), composed by Henry Mancini and written by Johnny Mercer. The song was even supposed to be removed from the movie for reasons of shortening. However, Audrey Hepburn, who sang Moon River in the movie, campaigned for the song to remain, which earned Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer an Oscar for Best Original Song in 1961.^[5]

15. Moon In Water - Underworld

If you read through the lyrics of the song Moon In Water by British band Underworld, you'll realize that the lyrics are more profound for a dance track than you might expect. The lyrics are based on the metaphor (The Moon Reflected in the Water) from the book The Book of Family Traditions on the Art of War by the Japanese samurai and Zen Buddhist student Yagyu Munenori.
The metaphor is made between the reflection of the moon and looking at our body in a mirror. The moon reflected in water is an immediate phenomenon. It is a metaphor for our human mind. Just as the moon is directly reflected in the water, things, objects are directly reflected by the mind.^[7]

16. New Moon On Monday - Duran Duran

In the book I Want My MTV: The Uncensored Story of the Music Video Revolution by Craig Marks and Rob Tannenbaum, Duran Duran band members Andy Taylor and Nick Rhodes say that the music video for the 1984 song New Moon On Monday is the band's least favorite.^[8]

In the official music video for the song, which begins with a theater scene, a moon appears in a cloudy night sky at exactly 02 minutes and 54 seconds. The scene with the moon only lasts about a second.

17. Can't Fight The Moonlight - LeAnn Rimes

Dianne Warren wrote the theme song Can't Fight the Moonlight for the 2000 American movie Coyote Ugly. The song is about how, as night falls, the love of two people in love can no longer be resisted. The moonlight that metaphorically reveals their real feelings for each other will be too strong and can no longer be suppressed.

18. Clouds Across The Moon - The RAH Band

Exactly 40 years after the creation of the 1984 song Clouds Across The Moon by The Rah Band, an official AI-generated music video was published.
The lyrics describe a conversation between a woman on Earth and her partner, a flight commander on Mars. The conversation between the two is not stable and the connection eventually breaks down due to violent storms in the asteroid belt. As she watches the clouds drifting over the moon, she hopes and prays that her partner will return to her soon.

19. Fly Me To The Moon - Frank Sinatra

The 1964 Frank Sinatra version of Fly Me To The Moon, written by American songwriter Bart Howard in 1954, was closely associated with the NASA Apollo program. The United States human spaceflight program had set itself the goal of flying people to the moon and bringing them safely back to earth. The goal was first achieved in 1969, when the two astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon and were later able to return safely to Earth with their crewmate Michael Collins.
Astronauts of the Apollo program such as Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were equipped with mixtapes compiled by Al Bishop and Mickey Kapp on their journey to the moon. They were able to listen to the music on a so-called Sony Proto-Walkman, the Sony TC-50.^[9]

20. The Whole of the Moon - The Waterboys

The original idea for the song The Whole Of The Moon came to Mike Scott in early 1985 when he was on his way back to the hotel with his girlfriend in New York City. She asked him if it was easy to write songs, which he immediately took up as a challenge. So he looked around for inspiration: “And there was a moon in the sky. This phrase ‘I saw the crescent, you saw the whole of the moon’ floated into my mind as if by magic, right on cue.”^[10]

21. Goodnight Moon - Shivaree

At the beginning of the new millennium, on March 24, 2000, the single Goodnight Moon by the American Americana and Alternative Country band Shivaree was released.
The song, whose lyrics would also fit in well at a Halloween party, is about a woman who spends a frightening night alone. She wishes for the night to end as quickly as possible and for the sun to rise, hence the metaphor "Goodnight Moon".

22. La Luna - Belinda Carlisle

The lyrics of Belinda Carlisle's 80s song (released on November 27, 1989) La Luna are about the protagonist's romantic memory of how she and her partner spent a night in love. She describes how they both fell under the spell of the moon under a clear starry sky and experienced a passionate night. At the end of the song, however, we as listeners are brought back from the past to reality. It turns out that the protagonist is now in Marseille at night under a gray winter sky, reminiscing about the time they spent this night in love under the moon, but the two are no longer together.

23. To The Moon - Meghan Trainor

You probably know Meghan Trainor from the song All About That Bass, one of the most successful YouTube videos with more than 2.5 billion views so far. In May 2024, she released her new single To The Moon. Numerous scenes in the amusing music video show the moon.

24. Talking To The Moon - Bruno Mars

Talking To The Moon is one of the first singles released by Bruno Mars and is the fourth single from his 2010 debut album Doo-Wops & Hooligans.
The song is about how a couple separated by a great distance try to establish some kind of emotional connection via the moon at night. Each of them hopes that if they both “talk” to the moon at the same time at night, they will be able to make a connection and gain hope.

25. Dancing in the Moonlight - Toploader

The lyrics of the song Dancing in the Moonlight describe how people dance together at night in the moonlight, have fun and enjoy the relaxed atmosphere. The cover version by the British band Toploader from 2000 was successful in the European, Australian and New Zealand official music charts. In the official lyrics video, animated skeletons, a werewolf and other Halloween characters dance together to the moonlight.

26. Moonlight Feels Right - Starbuck

The song Moonlight Feels Right by the American band Starbuck, which was just released in 1975 (December 31), is about a promising romantic night for a couple on the Chesapeake Bay by moonlight. In the song, the singer promises that they will drive to Chesapeake Bay in a car and the top will be lowered. They both lie back in the car and look at the constellations and how the moon smiles brightly, figuratively speaking.

27. Shame On To The Moon - Bob Seeger

The 1982 single Shame On The Moon by American singer-songwriter Bob Seger made it to #2 on the Billboard Top 100 in the week of February 26, 1983. The single stayed at #2 for four weeks, but had several weeks ahead of a song by a chart competitor that was hard to dislodge from #1, Billy Jean by Michael Jackson.^[11]

A possible interpretation of the lyrics: Shame On The Moon describes the complexity of a man and woman being together. As if the moon is supposed to take responsibility for the difficulties (which arise after perceiving the partner through rose-tinted glasses), the chorus reads: ... Shame On The Moon.

28. Moonlight Shadow - Mike Oldfield ft. Maggie Reilly

Mike Oldfield was inspired for the song Moonlight Shadow by the American film Houdini from 1953 starring Tony Curtis as Harry Houdini.^[12] The track from 1983 was Mike Oldfield's most successful single and reached top positions in the singles charts in several countries.
The sad lyrics are about a woman mourning the death of a man who was the victim of a violent crime on a Saturday night. The last time she saw him was in a shadow of moonlight.

29. Moonshadow - Yusuf / Cat Stevens

At the very beginning of the 70s, the British singer-songwriter Cat Stevens (known as Yusuf Islam since 1978) released the single Moonshadow.
A possible interpretation of the Moonshadow lyrics:
The light of the moon and the shadow of the moon stand for something permanent, like a light that always remains. Cat Stevens depicts the following scenario in the song: If he should gradually lose important body parts and bodily functions, he does not see the terrible catastrophe each time, but always sees something positive in it after all. Of course it's terrible to lose your body parts. But Cat Stevens uses this very drastic example to show that man, his self, consists of more than just the body.

30. Blue Moon - Billie Holiday

Her two jazz albums Billie Holiday Sings (10", released in 1952) and Solitude (12", is the Solitude album re-released in 1956, but with extra tracks) both contain the song Blue Moon. The song was originally written in 1934 by composer Richard Rodgers and lyricist Lorenz Hart. According to the internet portal secondhandsongs.com ^[13], there are 743 various versions of the original.
One possible interpretation of the lyrics:
The blue can stand for the color of the moon as well as a sad mood. In the lyrics, there is a positive turn from a person's loneliness to the appearance of a loved one. And the color of the moon changes from blue to gold.