W.O.C.K On Vinyl: Songs Of the Humpback Whales (1970)

 Before things get too serious here at Rock On Vinyl, I thought it might be fun to post a song / album at the end of each month, that could be categorized as being either Weird, Obscure, Crazy or just plain Korny.

Whale songs have probably been heard, though seldom recognized as such, ever since man began to make voyages by sea. In the literature ofwhaling alone there are many accounts of strange, ethereal sounds, reverberating faintly through a quiet ship at night, mystifying sailors in their bunks. Long after such experiences were first mentioned, scientists were able to explain what caused them... if the idea of whale 'singing' seems odd, the cause may lie in the several meanings of the word 'song'. Quite apart from any esthetic judgement one might make about them, the sounds produced by Humpback whales can properly be called songs because they occur in complete sequences that are repeated. Bird sounds are called songs for the same reason. Birds sing songs that are repeated fairly exactly and Humpback whales too are very faithful to their own individual sequences of sounds.

Humpback whale songs are far longer than bird songs. The shortest Humpback song recorded last six minutes and the longest is more than thirty minutes. The pauses between Humpback songs are no longer than the pauses between notes within the song: in other words, they are recycled without any obvious break. Again, in contrast with birds, who complete a song before pausing, it doesn't matter where in its song the Humpback starts or stops.

Dr. Roger S. Payne, whose work during the 1960's produced this record, spent fifteen years doing research in biological acoustics at The Institute for Research in Animal Behaviour operated jointly by the New York Zoological Society and The Rockefeller University.

Whale songs seem to have a universal appeal. Dr. Payne had played whale songs for many thousands of people in a wide variety of circumstances - at lectures throughout the United States and elsewhere: at the home of influental statesmen with guests invited to hear the songs; in the living rooms of performing artists; at colleges; in concerts; and in many other situations - and always, whatever the occasion, the people who listened have been affected, often profoundly moved, by the songs. Folk singers have begun to song about whales. Works of orchestral music have been composed with whale songs.

Finally, through art forms and through television, radio, newspapers, magazines, lectures and meetings of all kinds, people have begun to tell each other that the magnificant whale, now in peril of virtual extinction, must be saved. The world was finally 'turning on' to whales. [LP Liner Notes]

The International Whaling Commission (IWC) implemented a global moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986 to allow decimated whale stocks to recover. While it significantly reduced hunting, exceptions exist, with Norway, Iceland, and Japan continuing commercial whaling, often objecting to or bypassing the ban, killing over 45,000 whales since it began. Not cool !

Nevertheless, this Moratorium is widely considered to be a major conservation success, drastically reducing the annual catch from over 14,000 in 1980 to less than 1,000 in recent years, allowing several populations, especially the Humpback whales, to show strong signs of recovery.

Male Humpback whales are famous for singing songs to the females they are courting. Like humans, Humpback whales use a larynx to make these sounds. These songs are distinctly different within each breeding stock, yet some of them seem to share their songs with other groups. A 2019 study found out how the songs were evolving. Dr Rochelle Constantine and her co-authors discovered that Humpbacks from all over Oceania meet at New Zealand’s Kermadec Islands on their southern migration and share their songs with each other.

This post consists of MP3 (320) files freshly ripped from my treasured vinyl LP which I purchased from the Melbourne University's Bookshop back in the late 70's. I was undertaking my post-graduate studies in Marine Biology at the time, and was immediately attracted to these recordings when I saw them sitting amongst  the popular music section (strange hey !).   I still listen to these recordings some 45 years later, and am always mesmorised by the magicical sounds that these glorious mammals make.  

Side Note: It was always my dream to travel to Antartica while working for my supervisor as a research assistant (specialising in the

area of Antartic Terrestrial Alge), and was scheduled to do so in 1982, however, the Australian Government pulled the plug on all Biological Research funding in 1981 - redirecting it to Minning, and so the expedition was cancelled. In fact , my supervisor eventually lost his job as well, and returned to the UK from where he had come. What a bummer! So close, yet so far !

So this month's WOCK on Vinyl post definately ticks the O box for Obscurity (I doubt if you'll find this album available in this format elsewhere) and yes - stating the obvious - W for Whale.

Songs Of the Humpback Whale Link (78Mb)