Released 22 January 2007 Genre Alternative rock Writer(s) Damon Albarn | Recorded 2005 - 2006 Length 3:54 | |
Label Parlophone, Honest Jon's | ||
"Northern Whale" is a song by an unnamed alternative rock band fronted by Damon Albarn, and was released as the third track on their 2007 debut album The Good, the Bad and the Queen (see 2007 in British music). It initially started out as a song about someone that Albarn loved, but after the events involving a Bottlenose whale that got stuck in the River Thames the song became about that whale.
Contents
Background
When introducing the song at the band's first ever "official" gig (having already played three warm-up gigs in Devon) at The Roundhouse in Camden Town in October 2006, Albarn said that the song started out a year earlier as a love song for partner Suzi Winstanley when she was about to go to Antarctica to swim underwater with leopard seals, but then "a whale came up the Thames and it turned into a song about a whale". The so-called "River Thames whale", a Northern Bottlenose whale, ventured into the Thames on 20 January 2006, and this is where Albarn got the inspiration for the lyrics.
Music
The song starts with a synthesised part playing staccato crotchets. This riff is sequenced throughout the song. Light percussion woodblocks are added after a short while. The bass guitar joins the synthesiser and plays with it throughout the song.