Hollowfox: We (Woodchucks' Revenge) often do The Mary Ellen Carter in our sets. In introducing it, we frequently explain that this is about the only happy, upbeat, inspirational-type nautical ballad we know of, for just the reason you state. If anything goes seriously wrong, the ship is likely to sink, which is a tragedy. If nothing goes seriously wrong, there's nothing to write a song about.

We go on to explain that Stan got around this problem by sinking the ship in the very first line. After that, it had nowhere to go but up!

Peter.