[Silence]
[Instrumental Intro: Deep Sub-Bass, Swampy Electric Guitar, Low Piano, Organ, Drums, Percussion, Saxophone]
[Intro]
Crude…
(Screwed!)
Costs…
(Loss!)
How much?
Well…
(Bloody hell!)
[Verse 1]
Down at the dock
(What’s that shock?)
Tanker in the water
(Sinking like a rock?)
[Pre-Chorus]
The tank didn’t sink
(The price did rise)
Look at that number
(Before your eyes!)
Surprise
(Surprise)
[Refrain]
Ya woulda thought
(The tank sank)
You’d be at loss…
(Crude costs)
[Verse 2]
Time-charter earnings
(That’s the score)
One point two million
(Dollars a day or more!)
[Refrain]
Ya woulda thought
(The tank sank)
You’d be at loss…
(Crude costs)
[Bridge]
Did the ship sink?
(What do you think?)
It’s just the cost
(That’s lost)
[Break]
[Drums Drop to Half-Time]
Sixteen…
Thousand…
[Pause]
One-point-two…
Million!
[Band Hit]
A DAY!
(In pay)
[Instrumental]
[Extended Swampy Guitar Solo Over Deep Bass, Organ and Driving Piano — Saxophone Answers With Short Bursts]
[Final Refrain]
Ya woulda thought
(The tank sank)
You’d be at loss…
(Crude costs)
Noo…
It was the cost
(That was lost)
[Outro]
Ya woulda thought
(The tank sank)
You’d be at loss…
(Crude costs)
Noo…
It was the cost
(That was lost)
[Deep Bass Hit]
Crude costs!
[Bass Hit]
[Silence]
[End]
About the Song
Oil Shipping Costs Explode: From ~$16,000 to More Than $1.2 Million a Day
The cost of transporting crude oil by the world’s largest oil tankers has reached extraordinary levels.
On the benchmark TD3C route — a 270,000-metric-ton Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC) traveling from the Middle East Gulf to China — daily time-charter-equivalent (TCE) earnings have surged from roughly $16,000/day in 2020 to more than $1.2 million/day in September 2026.
That is not simply a large increase. It represents an extraordinary transformation in the economics of moving oil by sea.