“I Climbed The Mountain” is one of Strawberry Alarm Clock’s final singles, a non-LP song that was backed with “Three” in 1969 after the released of the band’s final LP, Good Morning Starshine. “I Climbed The Mountain” is a nice orchestrated pop song with a subtle air of spiritual redemption. This comes mostly from the lyrics, which quote the title of the well-known 1937 gospel song “Peace In The Valley” and have the general atmosphere of revivalist ecstasy)
Musically, “I Climbed The Mountain” is distinguished by two elements: a soft-rock string section and an interesting rat-tat-tat bass guitar part at the end of each measure. Vocalist Paul Marshall has a good voice that matches the orchestra pretty well, and he does a nice job with the tricky up-and-down melody.
The lyrics of “I Climbed The Mountain” are chock full of folk-gospel utopian visions, each line deepening the feeling of some religious experience having taken place. The singer describes climbing a mountain and seeing “the other side”, a perfect land to strive for:
“There was peace in the valley
There was hope in the land
There was joy in the children
There was love, beautiful love
In the heart of man”
Ultimately, “I Climbed The Mountain” is one of Strawberry Alarm Clock’s weaker singles, sounding more like “Put Your Hand In The Hand” by Ocean than you might expect. It wants to be a good song, and almost makes it, but there just seems to be a lack of conviction behind it.
“I Climbed The Mountain” appears on…
Good Morning Starshine (1969) [Japanese bonus-track version]
“I Climbed The Mountain” b/w “Three” (1969)
Strawberries Mean Love (1992)
I learned to play guitar at 13 after hearing this song played by two camp counselors and loved it. I sang this song for years and even at my younger brothers funeral because it was his favorite song I played. I never heard the original version until this year. The way I learned to play it was a lot slower an as a duet with someone doing harmony in the chorus section. I learned to play the song from memory and didn’t know about copy rights as a teenager. Now as a Senior Citizen I would love to find out how to get temporary copy rights enough to be allowed to post a YouTube video of play it during an open mike session or talent contest in our town but don’t know where to go or how to get permission to use it. This song has such a beautiful message it really needs to be shared again especially right now in times like this.
one of their weakest songs but so different from their others making it an indispensable curio
I just wanted to note something for collectors, since neither Allmusic nor Discogs has squat on this release. The song was composed by Carl Friberg and Ira Gasman. After SAC’s version tanked, Jerry Vale recorded it (on the album Jerry Vale’s World) and it got to #27 in 1970.
It’s still a really awesome song.
It’s amazing how executives think they know best about music. What would be the point of paying for the studio time and record pressing and everything to get this out and then not promote it??
But hey, nice job on the vocals regardless! Thanks for your comments on this site, too, it’s good to hear from you.
An accurate review. None of us really wanted to record this song, but Russ Regan (UNI) promised they’d get behind it and revive the band’s career. He made it sound like an ultimatum. Of course, once we’d recorded it, UNI had other things to get behind.