Mountain

All Music Guide:

The breakup of Cream in late 1968 had consequences that rippled across the rock music world -- in its wake were formed directly such bands as Blind Faith (whose tragedy was they never had a chance to actually become a band) and Ginger Baker's Air Force, as well as the rich solo careers of members Eric Clapton and Jack Bruce. And it yielded -- by way of Cream associate and producer Felix Pappalardi -- something of a successor band in 1969, in the form of Mountain.

The band's history all started with a Long Island-based psychedelic/garage band called the Vagrants, who'd acquired a serious local following and always seemed poised to break out, without ever actually doing so. Their lead guitarist, Leslie West, was a physically outsized figure as well as a musician extraordinaire whose playing had been completely transformed by his experience of hearing Clapton's playing in Cream. The Vagrants and West first crossed paths with Pappalardi in 1968, when he saw their potential and got them signed to Atlantic Records, where he was working as a producer. He had already made a name for himself producing Cream's Disraeli Gears album, and had played numerous background instruments on their follow-up, Wheels of Fire (and on the studio tracks that would form their Goodbye album). He did produce some of the best work that the Vagrants ever released, but none of it sold; and when West left the band in late 1968 to do a solo album, titled Mountain, Pappalardi produced it for him, as well as played keyboards and bass on the record. The results were the most impressive of West's career up to that time, a solid, blues-based hard rock workout, showing off just how profoundly he incorporated Clapton's playing into his own style -- Mountain sounded a great deal like the now-disbanded Cream, and was satisfying enough for the two to form a partnership, also called Mountain. Their first lineup was built around the one used on the album, with N.D. Smart on drums, and Steve Knight added on keyboards, while Pappalardi concentrated on playing the bass. Following a debut performance at the Fillmore West in July 1969, the group played its fourth live performance ever at Woodstock, in front of an audience of several hundred thousand, on a bill with the likes of Jimi Hendrix, the Who, the Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin, Creedence Clearwater Revival, and -- also getting their first national exposure at the same festival -- Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. The event was an auspicious one, even though it was followed by a personnel shift, as Smart was replaced by Corky Laing, West's oldest friend.

The group was signed to the Windfall label and released their debut LP, Mountain Climbing!, in the spring of 1970, accompanied by their debut single, "Mississippi Queen," which reached number 21 in June of 1970. That chart placement doesn't begin to delineate the impact of that single, a hard rock boogie that was a killer showcase for West's guitar and an unlikely piece of Southern-fried rock & roll, coming from the pens of the Queens- and Brooklyn-born West and Pappalardi, and the Canadian-born Laing -- it was as improbable as the California-born John Fogerty authoring "Born on the Bayou" or "Green River," and almost as enduring in popular culture. The single may not have reached the Top 20, but the album it was on peaked at number 17, driven by listeners drawn to the single but wanting more from the band behind it, and the high-energy mix of hard rock and blues they generated. And the debut album offered some surprises, such as the quartet's successful digression into progressive rock with "Theme from an Imaginary Western" (co-authored by Cream's Jack Bruce, which only further emphasized the indirect connections and musical debt owed the other band). The latter got lots of play on FM radio, as did "Never in My Life."

Equally important to the band's fortunes, they were able to deliver on-stage what they promised on their records -- indeed, their records were a surprisingly accurate representation of their actual sound, except that Mountain was even louder live than they were in the studio. The group scored another hit at the Atlanta International Pop Festival in 1970, alongside the Allman Brothers, Cactus. and others. Mountain's second album, Nantucket Sleighride, was equally successful commercially and unveiled the title track, which would take on epic proportions in concert. Flowers of Evil followed in November of 1971, just ten months after its predecessor, and it began to clearly show the strain of the pace the band had been keeping up since July of 1969 -- half of it consisted of lackluster studio originals, while the other half was a live medley and a concert version of "Mississippi Queen." Lackluster sales and reviews were inevitable, and the impression of a band running on empty was reinforced by their next release, Mountain Live (The Road Goes Ever On) (1972), which had only four cuts on it, all of them characterized by extended solos. Hardcore fans appreciated the record as an extension of their recordings, but many listeners and most critics found it lacking musical cohesion.

The group broke up soon after the release of that album, due in part to Pappalardi's concerns about his hearing, which been damaged by the high volume the band generated in concert. He returned to production, while West and Laing -- staying close to their hard rock roots, as well as the orbit whence Pappalardi had come -- teamed up with ex-Cream bassist Jack Bruce as West, Bruce & Laing, a hard rock power trio that cut a brief but memorable swathe of their own across the musical landscape in the early/mid-'70s. Meanwhile, a Best of Mountain LP released in the wake of the breakup helped to sustain interest in the group. And later in 1973, Mountain was back together, West and Pappalardi reactivating the band with Bob Mann on keyboards and guitar and Allan Schwartzberg on drums for a tour of Japan. This resulted in the live double LP Twin Peaks (1974), a much better representation of the group's concert sound, including a 32-minute version of "Nantucket Sleighride." During 1974, in the wake of the second live album, West, Laing, and Pappalardi revived Mountain again to record a studio LP, Avalanche. In subsequent years, West and Laing revived the group for live shows, sometimes joined by Pappalardi; West also performed with his own Leslie West Band. Sadly, Pappalardi was shot and killed by his wife in 1983. Two years later, West and Laing regrouped with Mark Clarke on bass and recorded an album before once again calling it quits. Laing served as PolyGram's A&R vice president in Canada between 1989 and 1995. In 1996, he reunited with West and Clarke for a new Mountain album, Man's World. West and Laing teamed up again in 2002 for another album as Mountain, Mystic Fire.

Wikipedia:

A mountain is a large landform that stretches above the surrounding land in a limited area usually in the form of a peak. A mountain is generally steeper than a hill. The adjective montane is used to describe mountainous areas and things associated with them. The study of mountains is called orography. Exogeology deals with planetary mountains, which in that branch of science are usually called montes (singular—mons). The highest mountain on Earth based from sea level is Mount Everest (8,848 m (29,029 ft)) in the Himalayas of Asia. The highest known mountain in the Solar System is Olympus Mons on the planet Mars at 21,171 m (69,459 ft). Mountains and mountain ranges on Earth are typically formed by the movement and/or interaction of lithospheric plates.

Definition

There is no universally accepted definition of a mountain. Elevation, volume, relief, steepness, spacing and continuity have been used as criteria for defining a mountain. In the Oxford English Dictionary a mountain is defined as "a natural elevation of the earth surface rising more or less abruptly from the surrounding level and attaining an altitude which, relatively to the adjacent elevation, is impressive or notable."

Whether a landform is called a mountain may depend on usage among the local people. The highest point in San Francisco, California, is called Mount Davidson, notwithstanding its height of 300 m (980 ft), which makes it ten feet short of the minimum for a mountain by American designations. Similarly, Mount Scott outside Lawton, Oklahoma is only 251 m (823 ft) from its base to its highest point.

Definitions of "mountain" include:

By this definition, mountains cover 64% of Asia, 25% of Europe, 22% of South America, 17% of Australia, and 3% of Africa. As a whole, 24% of the Earth's land mass is mountainous and 10% of people live in mountainous regions. Most of the world's rivers are fed from mountain sources, and more than half of humanity depends on mountains for water.

Characteristics

Tall mountains reach into the colder layers of the atmosphere. They are consequently subject to glaciation, and erosion through frost action. Such processes produce the peak shape. Some mountains have glacial lakes, created by melting glaciers; for example, there are an estimated 3,000 glacial lakes in Bhutan. Mountains can be eroded and weathered, altering their characteristics over time.

Tall mountains have different climatic conditions at the top than at the base, and will thus have altitudinal zonation of ecosystems. At the highest elevations, trees cannot grow, and whatever life may be present will be of the alpine type, resembling tundra. Just below the tree line, one may find subalpine forests of needleleaf trees, which can withstand cold, dry conditions. In regions with dry climates, the tendency of mountains to have higher precipitation as well as lower temperatures also provides for varying conditions, which in turn leads to differing flora and fauna. Some plants and animals found in these zones tend to become isolated since the conditions above and below a particular zone will be inhospitable and thus constrain their movements or dispersal. On the other hand, birds, being capable of flight, may take advantage of montane habitats and migrate into a region that would otherwise not provide appropriate habitat. These isolated ecological systems, or microclimates, are known as sky islands.

Mountains are generally colder than their surrounding lowlands due to the way that the sun heats the surface of the Earth. Practically all the heat at the surface of the Earth comes from the sun, in the form of solar energy. The sun's radiation is absorbed by land and sea, whence the heat is transferred into the air. Static air is a poor conductor of heat, so conduction of heat from the ground to the atmosphere is negligible. Heat is mainly transferred into the atmosphere through convection and radiation. The air immediately adjacent to the warmed surface will rise due to its buoyancy, leading to convective circulation, in the form of thermals, within the lowest layer of the atmosphere, the troposphere. When heat radiates from the surface of the earth, it is released as long-wave radiation, which can move freely through gases composed of diatomic molecules (such as the atmosphere's oxygen and nitrogen), but is readily absorbed by triatomic molecules, such as carbon dioxide and water vapor. Since most of the atmosphere's quantity of such triatomic gases is contained within the troposphere, this portion of the atmosphere is readily heated by the earth's radiation. The tropopause forms a blanket of air keeping the surface warm. This is the Greenhouse Effect. The higher the altitude, the less of this blanket there is to keep in the heat. Thus, higher elevations, such as mountains, are colder than surrounding lowlands. Air temperature in the troposphere decreases with gains in altitude. The rate at which the temperature drops with elevation, called the environmental lapse rate, is not constant (it can fluctuate throughout the day or seasonally and also regionally), but a normal lapse rate is 5.5°C per 1,000 m (3.57°F per 1,000 ft). The temperature continues to drop with increasing altitude, until the tropopause (11,000m or 36,089 ft in the U.S. Standard Atmosphere, where it does not decrease further. However, this is higher than the highest mountaintop.

Mountains are generally less preferable for human habitation than lowlands; the weather is often harsher, and there is little level ground suitable for agriculture. The decreasing atmospheric pressure means that less oxygen is available for breathing, and there is less protection against solar radiation (UV). Acute mountain sickness (caused by hypoxia—a lack of oxygen in the blood) affects over half of lowlanders who spend more than a few hours above 3,500 metres (11,480 ft).

Many mountains and mountain ranges throughout the world have been left in their natural state, and are today primarily used for recreation, while others are used for logging, mining, grazing, or see little use. Some mountains offer spectacular views from their summits, while others are densely wooded. Summit accessibility is affected by height, steepness, latitude, terrain, weather. Roads, ski lifts, or aerial tramways allow access. Hiking, backpacking, mountaineering, rock climbing, ice climbing, downhill skiing, and snowboarding are recreational activities enjoyed on mountains. Mountains that support heavy recreational use (especially downhill skiing) are often the locations of mountain resorts.

Mountains are made up of earth and rock materials. The outermost layer of the Earth or the Earth's crust is composed of seven primary plates. When two plates move or collide with each other, vast land areas are uplifted, forming mountains.

Types

Classified by the geological processes that shape them, there are five major types of mountains:

Geology

A mountain is usually produced by the movement of lithospheric plates, either orogenic movement or epeirogenic movement. Compressional forces, isostatic uplift and intrusion of igneous matter forces surface rock upward, creating a landform higher than the surrounding features. The height of the feature makes it either a hill or, if higher and steeper, a mountain. The absolute heights of features termed mountains and hills vary greatly according to an area's terrain. The major mountains tend to occur in long linear arcs, indicating tectonic plate boundaries and activity. Two types of mountain are formed in this way depending on how the rock reacts to the tectonic forces, — fold mountains or fault-block mountains. Other mountain building processes include volcanoes and sea floor spreading.

Fold mountains

Compressional forces in continental collisions may cause the compressed region to thicken and fold, with material forced both upwards and downwards. Since the less dense continental crust "floats" (cf iceberg) on the denser mantle rocks beneath, the weight of any crustal material forced upward to form hills, plateaus or mountains must be balanced by the buoyancy force (see isostasy) of a much greater volume forced downward into the mantle. Thus the continental crust is normally much thicker under mountains ( sometimes called "mountain roots"), compared to lower lying areas. However, in many continental collisions (e.g. the Himalayas) part of one continent may simply override the other, crumpling in the process with the overridden crust forming much of the support. Mountains may similarly be partly supported by oceanic crust subducted beneath the continental crust (e.g. the Andes as the Nazca plate flows beneath the South American Plate).

Fault-block mountains

Block mountains are created when large areas are widely broken up by faults creating large vertical displacements. This occurrence is fairly common. The uplifted blocks are block mountains or horsts. The intervening dropped blocks are termed graben: these can be small or form extensive rift valley systems. This form of landscape can be seen in East Africa, the Vosges, the Basin and Range province of Western North America and the Rhine valley. These areas often occur when the regional stress is extensional and the crust is thinned.

Rock that does not fault may fold, either symmetrically or asymmetrically. The upfolds are anticlines and the downfolds are synclines: in asymmetric folding there may also be recumbent and overturned folds. The Jura Mountains are an example of folding. Over time, erosion can bring about an inversion of relief: the soft upthrust rock is worn away so the anticlines are actually lower than the tougher, more compressed rock of the synclines.

Volcanoes

Some isolated mountains are produced by volcanoes, including many apparently small islands or seamounts that reach a great height above the ocean floor.

Mid-ocean ridges

The mid-ocean ridges formed during sea-floor spreading are often referred to as undersea mountain ranges due to their bathymetric prominence.