[1] After the very modest success of her previous album She Used to Wanna Be a Ballerina, Vanguard again teamed Sainte-Marie with renowned pop session musicians in its effort to improve sales and the amount of money she was making for the label.

[citation needed] Although the album itself fared little better commercially than its predecessor, only spending seven weeks on the Billboard Top 200, an extensive promotional campaign by Vanguard and extensive AM radio airplay saw the closing track, a cover of Mickey Newbury's "Mister Can't You See", become Sainte-Marie's sole significant commercial success in the States, spending two weeks in the lower reaches of the Top 40 in late April and early May 1972.

[7] Janet Maslin was more enthusiastic about the record in Rolling Stone, applauding Sainte-Marie's stylistic range and refashioning of her vocals to suit the music's varied moods.

"[8] Ramparts magazine found the song selection effectively diverse, the music powerful, and Saint-Marie "capable of writing lines that jump out of a loudspeaker and grab the listener by the mind".

[3] In another retrospective review, AllMusic's William Ruhlmann wrote that Moonshot was "not the Buffy Sainte-Marie of her early political period, but the album demonstrates her versatility, and it works as an appealing pop effort.