"Shark Fin Blues" is a double A-side single taken from Australian rockers the Drones' second studio album, ''

Wait Long by the River and the Bodies of Your Enemies Will Float By ''Wait Long by the River and the Bodies of Your Enemies Will Float By'' is the second album released by the Drones. Recorded "100% live" (like its predecessor), the album draws influence from the likes of Neil Young and Rowland S. Howard, thou ...

'' (April 2005). The single was released on 25 September 2006. It also appeared as a limited edition, 7" picture disc, together with the band's fourth album, '' Gala Mill'' (September 2006). The band's most popular song, "Shark Fin Blues" - "an anthem of sorts for the disenfranchised and melancholic" written after the passing of lead singer

Gareth Liddiard Gareth Liddiard (born 20 November 1975) is an Australian musician, best known as a founding member of both The Drones and Tropical Fuck Storm. Musically active since 1997, he has also released a solo album titled '' Strange Tourist'' in 2010 ...

's mother - was voted the greatest Australian song of all time by the band's contemporaries in 2009 and is now widely considered to be a classic.

Composition

The song starts off "hazy" and "distorted" over "restrained drumming" and gradually builds up, "expanding and filling with screeching guitars and a contagious chorus of "na na na’s"". The instrumentation on this track has been described as "jarring" while Liddiard's vocals have been described as "brutal". Liddiard describes the intro as a "fudged

Townes Van Zandt John Townes Van Zandt (March 7, 1944 – January 1, 1997) was an American singer-songwriter.

riff" whilst the outro was improvised by Rui Pereira. The song, whose lyrics were written over "Same Old Man" by Karen Dalton, was composed after the passing of Liddiard's mother and has been described as "an anthem of sorts for the disenfranchised and melancholic". The allegorical lyrics contain

biblical The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...

and

maritime Maritime may refer to: Geography * Maritime Alps, a mountain range in the southwestern part of the Alps * Maritime Region, a region in Togo * Maritime Southeast Asia * The Maritimes, the Canadian provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Pr ...

imagery and has been compared to '' The Rime of the Ancient Mariner'', its protagonist describing the sinking of his ship as the titular "sharks" surround him "fin by fin".

Reception

Critical

The song was originally received favorably, with Brandon Stosuy of ''

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'' calling it "one of the best rockers of the year, a seemingly endless path of riffs and dynamics and a good introduction to Liddiard's nihilistic subject matter". Mike Diver of ''

Drowned in Sound ''Drowned in Sound'', sometimes abbreviated to ''DiS'', is a UK-based music webzine financed by artist management company Silentway. Founded by editor Sean Adams, the site features reviews, news, interviews, and discussion forums. History '' ...

'' was more mixed in his assessment, calling it "a decent composition executed decently, but far from the original blast of frazzled blues it wishes to be", comparing it unfavorably to the band's live performances.

Legacy

In a poll of contemporary Australian songwriters in 2009, organised by national youth broadcaster

Triple J Triple J (stylised in all lowercase) is a government-funded, national Australian radio station intended to appeal to listeners of alternative music, which began broadcasting in January 1975. The station also places a greater emphasis on broad ...

, "Shark Fin Blues" was voted as the greatest Australian song of all time. On being asked about the ranking the following year by Andrew McMillen, Liddiard expressed ambivalence, speculating that many of those voting may have been "5-6 years younger" than the band members themselves. In the same interview, he also states that he is "sick to fuckin' death of" playing the song live, despite conceding that " ere’s nothing you can do about that, really. I’m always saying, "Let’s fuck 'Shark Fin' off, we don’t have to do it!”, but it’s the band who probably want to hear it more than anyone else. I don’t know why." In 2014, Denham Sadler of ''

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'' wrote that "part of the song’s power is that Liddiard refuses to provide the listener a throwaway silver lining ..instead it is a raw and brutally honest account of depression ..a song that unflinchingly bares its writer’s despair, detailed in an intimate, introspective way." The following year, ''

The Sydney Morning Herald ''The Sydney Morning Herald'' (''SMH'') is a daily compact newspaper published in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, and owned by Nine. Founded in 1831 as the ''Sydney Herald'', the ''Herald'' is the oldest continuously published newspaper ...

'' observed that the song is "considered by many to be an Australian classic." In November 2020, ''

Junkee Junkee is an Australian popular culture and news website run by new media company Junkee Media. It covers various topics including film, university, food, TV, politics, travel, career, health and Internet culture. Its target demographic is 18- to ...

'' ranked the song 5th on their list of "The 200 Greatest Australian Songs of All Time" - a list that partially takes into account submissions from other Australian musicians.

Track listing

# "Shark Fin Blues" - 4:34 # "You Really Don't Care" - 4:40

Missy Higgins version

On 7 July 2014, Australian artist

Missy Higgins Melissa Morrison Higgins (born 19 August 1983), known professionally as Missy Higgins, is an Australian singer-songwriter and musician. Her Australian number-one albums are ''The Sound of White'' (2004), ''On a Clear Night'' (2007) and ''The Ol ...

released "Shark Fin Blues" as the first single from her fourth studio album, '' Oz'' (September 2014). It debuted at number No. 71 on the ARIA Singles Chart on the week commencing 18 August. The video clip was released via YouTube on 11 August.

Reception

In an album review, Helena Ho from ''

Renowned for Sound ''Renowned for Sound'' is an Australian online magazine An online magazine is a magazine published on the Internet, through bulletin board systems and other forms of public computer networks. One of the first magazines to convert from a prin ...

'' said the song "begins with simple piano chords so that the bare beauty of Higgins' vocals are highlighted. She sings with such passion and emotion, you can hear her voice tremble with it. It's liberating when the strings and piano eventually swell together for the final hook." Ali Birnie from Beat Magazine said the song is the album highlight.

References

{{Missy Higgins 2005 singles 2014 singles The Drones (Australian band) songs 2005 songs