"
Sailing" is a song written by
Gavin Sutherland and recorded by The Sutherland Bros. Band (featuring the
Sutherland Brothers Gavin and Iain), released in June 1972, it can be found on their album entitled 'Lifeboat' released in the same year.
Rod Stewart recorded the song at
Muscle Shoals Sound Studio in
Muscle Shoals, Alabama, for his 1975
album Atlantic Crossing, and it was subsequently a number one hit in the UK in September 1975 for four weeks. The single returned to the UK top ten a year later when used as the theme music for the
BBC documentary series
Sailor, about
HMS Ark Royal, and made a minor chart appearance when re-released as a charity single after the
Zeebrugge ferry disaster in 1987. Having been a hit twice, it remains Stewart's biggest-selling single in the UK.
The music video was shot in
New York Harbour in 1975 and credited with a 1978 completion date; it also was one of the
first to be aired on
MTV when it launched on August 1, 1981. However, despite Stewart's great popularity in the
United States, the song never climbed higher than number 58 on the
Billboard Hot 100.
Rod Stewart performed the song at the
Concert for Diana (a concert in memory of
Diana, Princess of Wales, who had
died 10 years earlier) at
Wembley stadium on 1 July 2007.
In the British sitcom
Keeping Up Appearances, the band was playing this song as Hyacinth and Richard were trying to make it to the
Queen Elizabeth 2.
The melody has been used for the chant "
No One Likes Us - We......
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