Starbuck's sharpening his harpoon.

40 Mountain, 'Nantucket Sleighride', 41 David Crosby, 'The Lee Shore'

I have a fascination with the sea. It doesn't extend to me wanting to muck around on boats but I love the romance of the sea and the idea of old sailing vessels like the Cutty Sark. I stood behind the wheel of that ship in London and I could image what it must have felt like to sail on it. When we lived in Leigh-on-sea we would often wander around the estuary and enjoy all of the sights and sounds and smells of the old fishing boats docked there. It seems like I've usually found myself living close to the sea.

Songs about the sea do it for me time and again whether they be allegorical (Split Enz - Six Months in a Leaky Boat), of disaster ( Gordon Lightfoot's The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald), of the old whaling days (Nantucket Sleighride) or of carefree abandon ( CSN's Southern Cross).

I'm not going to write too much this time - instead I'll let the music do it for me. Two versions of The Lee Shore - the CSNY one with Neil playing some sublime guitar is a favourite version of Crosby's dream/song and you can almost taste the salt in Mountain's song of whaling, harpoons and Starbuck!