(singing) Soon may the Wellerman come
To bring us sugar and tea and rum
One day, when the tonguin' is done We'll take our leave and go
At this point, if you’re not already singing along to this 19th-century New Zealand song about whale hunting,
then dive into this sea of shanties, my friends.
The water is actually...ice cold.
The jaunty earworm that is "The Wellerman" became TikTok's first viral hit of 2021.
It turns out shanties are surprisingly perfect music for pandemic times.
Having spent months in isolation, our spirits needed lifting.
Kind of like a bunch of sailors out at sea.
So we sang like they would sing – all together.
–Shanties were originally used to do work to.
So, you'd have men on a ship
doing manual tasks, like pulling on ropes, or turning the capstan round.
And in order to keep those things in sync, which was essential,
They'd sing songs. So, you'd often have a call and response –
(singing) As I was a-walking down Paradise Street
(To me!) Way, hey! Blow the man down
And that rhythm will keep everyone going at the same pace,
so you don't get your sails all skewiff.
And I think that has really transferred over to the modern world, because we
(singing) And the land is dark
–We don't get together very much any more
There's people that go to church and go to football games that sing along together,
without any accompaniment, but apart from that, not so much.
And I think there's an element of that that people are missing now.
So you can see how shanties, ballads which strongly encourage communal singing,
have suddenly become so popular on a platform like TikTok,
where the Duet feature lets creators from all over the world sing a song together.
(singing) There once was a ship that put to sea
And the name of that ship was the Billy o' Tea
The winds blew hard, her bow dipped down
Blow, me bully boys, blow
–There's something to be said about the way they're written, as well.
Because if you want to compare against modern pop songs and so on, there's a lot of
"me, I," that sort of thing.
But with that whole kind of maritime theme, there's often a really good, strong story.
And with "The Wellerman," as well, it's not like,
"Hey, we're out at sea, isn't everything great?"
It's, "Damn, this is really hard work and really horrible."
And it's a story that you can engage with.
And, admittedly, at the moment, a lot of people can relate to being stuck in a nasty place.
Combine that with something, which sounds great and has a really good, strong feeling to it and
you can immediately catch on to it and want to feel more of it and take part in it.
And, suddenly, you got this like perfect storm of what we see now,
where everyone wants to be a part of it and sing it.
(singing) Soon may the Wellerman come
To bring us sugar and tea and rum
One day, when the tonguin' is done We'll take our leave and go
These people that are coming into it now and discovering it for the first time are the future of folk music
Folk music lives on and exists not because it's been stuck in a museum somewhere.
It exists because people listen to it and engage with it and reinterpret it and keep it alive and sing it as it goes along.
British group The Longest Johns helped the digital revival of sea shanties
with a 2018 recording of ‘Soon May the Wellerman Come’,
which has since gotten nearly 30 million streams on YouTube and Spotify.
It’s actually that version of the song that went viral on TikTok,
thanks to a rendition by Scottish singer/postman Nathan Evans.
(singing) Before the boat had hit the water
The whale's tail came up and caught her
All hands to the side, harpooned and fought her
When she dived down low
Offline – remember when gigs were a thing – shanties were getting popular, too.
The best example and story of that for when it first really clicked was we were supporting
a mainstream pop artist in Bristol.
We marched out on the stage to do our first set
and start singing all this traditional shanty stuff and they're all kind of going through this,
"What the hell is this?"
And then by the end of the song, it completely changed to,
"This is really cool." And they were singing along, they were clapping, they were getting involved.
And it was a fantastic evening.
And it's kind of that same experience that the two guys in the car went through.
(singing) Soon may the Wellerman come
To bring us sugar and tea and rum
We've kind of known for a long time now that there's tons of sea shanties that, yeah,
given they'll be reinterpreted to some degree, maybe some of the language changed,
(singing) Four hours, keepin' our feet
Four hours, wrap me in the shroud
And four hours Lay me in the ground
–But a lot of them remained very much the same.
And we got into them and thought they were fantastic.
And we know, from doing shows,
that other people think that, as well.
All they need is the right medium in front of them to present it to them.
And, I guess, through TikTok, we found that's the medium.
(singing) The winds blew hard, her bow dipped down
Blow, my bully boys, blow
Soon may the Wellerman come
To bring us sugar and tea and rum
One day, when the tonguing' is done We'll take our leave and go
I think we're just overjoyed that this has happened, in a way,
because we have been trying to get sea shanties in front of everybody's faces for such a long time.
In many ways we were lucky to
find the genre in the first place. We were lucky to be
brought into the amazing community that already existed.
Lucky to find an online audience, who were as enamored with it as we were.
And then now lucky to be
here at the point when it's really taken off.
So, yeah, we're the luckiest band in the world.
(singing) Oh, leave her, Johnny, leave her!
For the voyage is done and the winds don't blow
And it's time for us to leave her