Lyrics: Robert Hunter
Music: Jerry Garcia
Recorded by the Grateful Dead for their 'Aoxomoxoa' album released in 1969. The re-mixed recording, released in 1972, dropped many
of the effects used on the original version of this track.
It was never played live by the Grateful Dead. Once, on 26 April 1969, the recorded version was played over the PA during 'feedback'.
Waves of violet go crashing and laughing
Rainbow winged singing birds fly round the sun
Sunbells rain down in a liquid profusion
Mermaids on porpoises draw up the dawn
What's become of the baby
This cold December morning
Songbirds frozen in their flight
Drifting to the earth
Remnants of forgotten dreaming
Calling; answer comes there none
Go to sleep you child
Dream of never ending always
Panes of crystal
Eyes sparkle like waterfalls
Lighting the polished ice caverns of Khan
But where in the looking-glass fields of illusion
Wandered the child who was perfect as dawn
What's become of the baby
This cold December morning
What's become of the baby
This cold December morning
Racing, rhythms of the sun
All the world revolves
Captured in the eye of Odin
Allah, pray where are you now
All Mohammed's men blinded by the sparkling waters
Sheherezade gathering stories to tell
From primal gold fantasy petals that fall
But where is the child
Who played with the sun chimes
And chased the cloud sheep
To the regions of rhyme
Stranded
Stranded cries the south wind
Lost in the regions of lead
Shackled by chains of illusion
Delusions of living and dead
| Grateful Dead Recordings | |||||
| Date | Album | ||||
| studio 1969 | Aoxomoxoa | ||||
| Recordings by other artists | |||||
| 2009 | Henry Kaiser Plays Dead | Henry Kaiser | |||
| 2016 | Day Of The Dead | s t a r g a z a | |||
I think a lot of people don't realise that "What's Become Of The Baby" was a very beautiful, art-nouveau kind of thing. But the thing was, Jimi Hendrix was going to come over to the studio, so we decided to get it good and weird so he could hear it.
I'll just start it, to give you an idea how Jerry originally wrote it, and what it was intended to sound like. I won't get the chords right, so I'll just sing a verse.
[sings first verse and chorus]
It was a minuet, but we already had one minuet on the record, which was "Mountains Of The Moon," so we just got really ripped and decided to screw with it bad!