The monitor is an weekly column dedicated to everything that happens in the world of WIRED culture, from movies to memes, from TV to Twitter.
Earlier this week, it seemed inevitable that this column had something to do with President Trump’s second impeachment. In a week when Republicans compared the president’s impeachment to a “cancellation” and said that Trump’s Twitter startup was similar to censorship, it was tempting to weigh in. (If freedom of expression is being stifled, how is it possible that it is everything I hear about in all the main media in the world? How?) But I rambled. Because? Songs of the sea.
To keep everyone up to date, the songs of the sea are the smiling woman in the Distracted Boyfriend meme – they divert your attention, no matter what is taking up your time. Originating in merchant ships in the 18th century, the songs – designed to help sailors with their tasks – began to take off on TikTok after a 26-year-old Scottish postman named Nathan Evans posted a video of him singing a song called “Soon May the Wellerman Come ”(sometimes just called“ Wellerman ”) in the last week of 2020. He has performed duets thousands of times since then and has become an online obsession. (If you haven’t rolled r / seashanties yet, you really should.)
Because? Why, in the midst of a political crisis in the United States and a global pandemic, did everyone turn to songs that sound like the tenen were trying to be? The conclusion that most people came to is that the songs of the sea are a rest. That at a time when people need to be distant, joining in music – even in TikTok – feels like a moment of unity, or socially distant karaoke. (God, I miss karaoke.) “These are unifying and survival songs, designed to turn a large group of people into a collective body,” wrote Kathryn VanArendonk for Vulture, “all working together to keep the ship afloat.” Likewise, as Amanda Petrusich noted in The New Yorker, “It seems possible that after almost a year of loneliness and collective self-banishment and overwhelming travel and adventure restrictions, singing may be providing a brief glimpse into a different and more exciting way of life, a world of sea air and pirates and groggy, of many people singing in unison, of being free to take off courageously to what Melville called ‘true places’, the uncorrupted views that cannot be located on any map ”. (As for the discrepancies in spelling between “favela” and “canto”, your guess is as good as mine.)
These things are undoubtedly true. After almost a year of quarantine and fear, having something simple that you can sing along with even if you are deaf-sound is welcome. The non-ironic embrace of something that looks old and ethereal also fits the spirit of TikTok perfectly. But, at the same time, the consumption of collective culture has been one of the hallmarks of the pandemic, of a collective obsession with Tiger King to “WAP.” Not to mention that players sang songs while playing Sea of thieves long before the pandemic arrives. Yes, part of that popularity came courtesy of Longest Johns, the cappella folk band that released a version of “Wellerman” in 2018, but still.