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  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Songs of the southern oceans - 22 tracks

    Comes in cardboard sleeve with printed 8 page booklet

    Shipping outside Australia takes 2-3 weeks using standard postage. Contact us for any queries.

    Includes unlimited streaming of Crossing the Line via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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  • Full Digital Discography

    Get all 4 Forty Degrees South releases available on Bandcamp and save 15%.

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Crossing the Line, Life Of Brine, Shore Leave, and Hazard, Hardship And Damned Little Pay. , and , .

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about

An autobiographical tale, written on a prawning trawler in Exmouth Gulf, 1270km north of Perth, West Australia. As a lad seeking adventure, Barry found work on a twenty-one metre Learmonth K trawler. He now lives in land-locked Alice Springs, almost as far away from water as is possible in Australia.

lyrics

When I was fishing back in the west
and rolling on the foaming sea.
I’d dream of them pretty girls back on the shore
and I wish they were here with me.

Chorus:
So step on board me Ocean Liner
Step on board without delay me lads
Step on board there’s nothing finer
And together we’ll sail away

I made up my mind to take to the wave
on hearing of good return.
So the very next morning I found myself prawning
and my stomach it began to churn.

Working twenty-four hours a day,
with me eyes hanging out of my head.
Twenty-four hours barely making a wage
and I wish I was back in my (her) bed.

Seven cents a kilo for Kings they said,
eight cents a kilo Endeavour’s.
And it’s ten cents a kilo for Tiger prawns,
but for that they want the best out of you.

I’m a long way from mother out here on the wave,
a long way from family.
And a bloody long way from being a tap dancer,
that me mother oh so wanted me to be.

The skipper a big man he stands so high,
his head pokes up through the rigging.
And the crew, they’re all druggo’s and they’re so high,
I think they’ve left the land of the living.

So I’m eating and thinking and sorting prawns,
till they flaming well come out of my ears.
And the cook gives me the shits in more ways than one
So I think I’m on me very last run.

credits

from Crossing the Line, released July 9, 2021
Barry Skipsey 1979

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Forty Degrees South Sydney, Australia

A Sydney folk group known from 1988 for their powerful impact when singing unaccompanied traditional songs.

Strong individual singers, the interplay of their combined voices makes for a distinctive sound.

Sea shanties and other songs of maritime and industrial history and union songs feature large in their repertoire, songs with a robust quality that tell of real people, their lives and work. ... more

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