In the proud tradition of shantycraft, “Shantyman’s Life,” the latest single from Canadian Celtic folk-rocker Séan McCann, is about the matter of the work at hand. While a good portion of the song is dedicated to defining the role of a “shantyman,” the song also seems to be a reflection of McCann’s opinion on how much labour is valued — whether you’re hauling on a bowline or releasing music into the world.
Of course, as a founding member of Great Big Sea, McCann is no stranger to sea shanties. These are songs designed to make the work go faster, keeping the team on track when it comes to making well-timed and well-coordinated efforts, and, for years, these have been the bread and butter of McCann’s repertoire. They’re traditionally meant to be sung aloud, often in large groups (if not an entire ship’s crew), breaking both silence and monotony.
For McCann, working through the isolation of the last two years has inspired him—or perhaps out of sheer necessity—to craft out his latest album, Shantyman. It’s a full album of songs intended to be sung out loud in the company of others.
“I spent the last six months making Shantyman to keep myself from going slowly insane in the absence of any live in-person concert interaction,” says McCann. “The shanty is the ultimate work song designed specifically to help people overcome difficult challenges by working together in harmony to get the job done. Music is medicine, and I believe it is no accident the shanty has resurfaced now when we so desperately need songs that bind us.”
McCann tapped friends Hawksley Workman, Gordie Johnson (Big Sugar), Jeremy Fisher, and fiddler J.P. Cormier, to help record his fifth album—all remotely, as has been doctor prescribed. Johnson can be even seen traipsing through the wilderness on the song’s new video.
There’s one particular line in “Shantyman’s Life” that sticks out: “A shantyman’s life is a wearisome one, though some say it’s free from care.” You could apply the to the long list of chores and woes associated with the job—it traditionally demands a good deal of chopping and hauling—but it might just be applied to McCann’s current approach to music.
Shantyman is, notably, not available to be streamed. McCann has instead gone the more traditional route of directly selling his albums to his audience, and he can hardly be blamed for it. He cites Spotify’s abysmal payout of $0.00437 per stream, along with a handful of alternatives that aren’t much better.
“It is unconscionable to profit so perversely off the labour of actual creators so you won’t be able to consume my new songs for next to nothing anytime soon,” says McCann.
And so, McCann has lent his voice to the growing chorus of artists that wish for their work to be genuinely recognized as work, rather than the tail-end of a microtransaction designed for a middleman to grow rich on. Rather than mistaking the shantyman’s life for a carefree one, he asks that we regard music as both a labour of love and the medicine that’s gotten many of us through a difficult period and compensated accordingly.
Should you want to hear more of McCann’s Shantyman, it is available for purchase exclusively through seanmccansings.com.