Songfacts®:

• Set at sea from the perspective of a sailor, Procol Harum's lyricist Keith Reid told us that this is one of his favorites. Reid founded the band with lead singer/pianist Gary Brooker, who would put music to Keith's words. In our 2010 interview, Brooker told us that he was always coming up with musical ideas that he could marry to Reid's words. Said Brooker: "Usually the best combinations do happen very naturally. If we take something like 'A Salty Dog' that was a musical idea, it's very much a type of chord progression with a certain rhythm. And I think soon after I got that idea, Keith sent me the words and they were already done, and they just seemed to fit with it very, very easily."
• Procol Harum broke up in 1977, but got back together in 1991 and has done many tours ever since. Brooker told us how he keeps it fresh: "Some songs I must have sung thousands of times. Of course, they've been around for 40 years, you know. 'A Salty Dog' or 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale' or anything, but I always put myself into them, the lyrics are interesting enough that every time you sing them you can always, if you feel like it, just think of it in a different way, as you are vocalizing." (See our interview with Gary Brooker.)