Hovercraft
Circa 1996 L - R: Eddie Vedder, Beth Liebling, Ryan Campbell
Background information
Origin	Seattle, Washington, USA
Genre(s)	Space rock Noise rock Experimental Rock Psychedelic rock
Years active	1993 – 2001
Label(s)	Blast First/ Mute Repellent
Associated acts	Pearl Jam
Members
Campbell 2000 Sadie 7 Dash 11
Former members
Paul 4 Jerome 230 Karl 3-30
Notable instrument(s)
Guitar,Bass Guitar,Drums ,Tape Loops

City nickname Emerald City City bird Great Blue Heron City flower Dahlia City mottos The City of Flowers The City of Goodwill City song Seattle, the Peerless City Mayor Greg Nickels County King County Area   - Total   - Land   - Water   - % water 369. ... Official language(s) None Capital Olympia Largest city Seattle Area  Ranked 18th  - Total 71,342 sq mi (184,827 km²)  - Width 240 miles (385 km)  - Length 360 miles (580 km)  - % water 6. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_the_United_States. ... A music genre is a category (or genre) of pieces of music that share a certain style or basic musical language (van der Merwe 1989, p. ... For space rocks, see asteroid. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Art rock. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... See also: 1993 in music (UK) Musical groups established in 1993 Record labels established in 1993 other events of 1993 list of years in music 1990s in music // January 8 - The U.S. Postal service issues an Elvis Presley stamp. ... See also: 2001 in music (UK) Musical groups established in 2001 Record labels established in 2001 other events of 2001 list of years in music 2000s in music // January 1 Comeback of Guns N Roses in House of Blues Hum disbands. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Blast First is a noted sublabel of one time indie Mute Records. ... Mute Records is a record label formed in 1978 by Daniel Miller primarily to release his own single, T.V.O.D./Warm Leatherette, under the moniker The Normal. ... Pearl Jam is an American rock band formed in Seattle, Washington, and is considered one of the most influential bands of the 1990s. ...

Overview

Instrumental experimental rock group Hovercraft formed in 1993 in Seattle, Washington. It was co-founded by its core duo of guitarist/samplist/tape looper Ryan Campbell, and bassist Beth Liebling [1]. Liebling and Campbell would use the pseudonyms "Sadie 7" and "Campbell 2000" throughout the duration of the band's history. Hovercraft has been cited as one of the most abrasive, non-commercial sounding bands ever to receive major label distribution for its albums. It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Art rock. ... City nickname Emerald City City bird Great Blue Heron City flower Dahlia City mottos The City of Flowers The City of Goodwill City song Seattle, the Peerless City Mayor Greg Nickels County King County Area   - Total   - Land   - Water   - % water 369. ... Official language(s) None Capital Olympia Largest city Seattle Area  Ranked 18th  - Total 71,342 sq mi (184,827 km²)  - Width 240 miles (385 km)  - Length 360 miles (580 km)  - % water 6. ... Eddie Vedder Eddie Vedder (born in Evanston, Illinois as Edward Louis Seversen III on 23 December 1964) is the lead singer, lyricist, guitarist and frontman for the band Pearl Jam. ... A pseudonym or allonym is a name (sometimes legally adopted, sometimes purely fictitious) used by an individual as an alternative to their birth name. ...

Early history

Liebling and Campbell, who met as anatomy students in medical school, had been playing together in the band Space Helmet since Liebling had moved to Seattle. Space Helmet broke up due to Campbell's relocation to New York. The rest of the band, except Liebling, but initially including Campbell's brother, continued and formed Magnog[2]. Campbell did not remain in New York long, and the newly-christened Hovercraft was formed upon his return. A medical school or faculty of medicine is a tertiary educational institution or part of such an institution that teaches medicine. ...

Hovercraft's sound came to be characterized by Campbell's effects-laden guitar soundscapes, which made heavy use of delay and reverb on his main guitar, a black Fender Stratocaster. The use of effects enabled him to often simulate the simultaneous playing of multiple guitarists, though he was always the lone guitarist in the studio and onstage. Leibling generally played single-note, ominous, pulsating basslines, letting the guitar take the spotlight. Early drum beats were generally sparse, yet jazzy; they became more complex and bold as the band gradually added more highly-skilled drummers over the years.

In 1995, after several years of jamming together with various members, Hovercraft released its first single on the band's own record label, Repellent Records. Recorded in August of 1994, "Zero Zero Zero One" featured "Paul 4" on drums and on "box of nails." No track titles were given, but "0001-A" and "0001-B" are etched into either band of the vinyl sides. It was also released as a VHS tape "video single" in a simple black slipcase.

Beth And Eddie In Hype!

The single was initially handed out at gigs; stickers affixed to the plastic slip of ones sold in stores boasted, "Featuring Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam." "Paul 4" is believed to be the pseudonym of early member Bobby Tamkin (later of Xu Xu Fang), and it is known that Vedder used the name "Jerome230" when he toured with Hovercraft opening for Mike Watt's spring 1995 tour in support of his "star"-studded album Ball-Hog or Tugboat?. Hovercraft and Dave Grohl's new band, Foo Fighters, played short sets before both Grohl and Vedder would join headliner Watt as members of his band. This was Hovercraft's first tour, as well as the first major tour for Grohl since the suicide of Kurt Cobain. Hype! soundtrack album cover Hype! is a documentary directed by Doug Pray about the popularity of grunge music in the late 1980s and the early 1990s. ... Eddie Vedder (born Edward Louis Severson III on December 23, 1964) is the lead singer, and one of three guitar players, for the rock band Pearl Jam. ... Pearl Jam is an American rock band formed in Seattle, Washington, and is considered one of the most influential bands of the 1990s. ... Michael David Watt (born December 20, 1957 in Portsmouth, Virginia) is a bass guitarist, singer and songwriter, best-known for co-founding the punk rock bands The Minutemen and fIREHOSE; as of 2003, he is also the bassist for the reunited Iggy Pop & The Stooges. ... Ball-Hog Or Tugboat? is the debut solo album by former Minutemen and fIREHOSE bassist, songwriter and vocalist Mike Watt. ... David Eric Grohl (born January 14, 1969, in Warren, Ohio) is an American rock musician and songwriter. ... Foo Fighters are a alternative rock group formed by musician Dave Grohl in 1995. ... Kurt Donald Cobain (February 20, 1967 – c. ...

Beth In Hype

Though Vedder donned a long wig in order to conceal his face somewhat, it did not take long for his true identity to become widely known. Subsequent Hovercraft tours would often be flooded with fans of the Pearl Jam frontman. They would soon be disappointed, as Vedder had been replaced by former Pearl Jam drummer, Dave Krusen, who adopted the stage name "Karl 3-30." With a more technically proficient drummer, the band was now free to play beyond the lo-fidelity noise experiments of its debut release, and play proper shows with structured improvisation and avant experimantalism. Dave Krusen (March 10, 1966, Tacoma, Washington) is an American rock drummer who is best known for his work with Pearl Jam on their hit CDs, Ten. ...

Angular Momentum (Live performances, motifs)

Live shows were marked by a stage prepared in adavance of entrance by crowds. When the band did enter, not a word was uttered, and eye contact was never made with spectators. The stage was shrouded in darkness as a projector played black & white scientific films and space-themed documentary clips from the reel-to-reel era (1940s-1970s), somewhat synchronized to the music. Examples of film material: insects mating, time-lapse footage of flowers blooming, and asteroids crashing. Though often featuring fragments of album tracks, each live show was played as a single forty to forty-five minute long semi-improvised piece with no breaks. A Sony TC-630 reel-to-reel recorder, once a common household object. ...

Hovercraft Live

The group's artwork, album titles, and song titles ("Haloparidol", "Vagus Nerve", "Phantom Limb", "Endoradiosonde" (a kind of "Radio Transmittor Pill", "Benzedrine", "De-Orbit Burn") featured foreboding themes of medical, astronautical and scientific experimentation, satellite imagery, auditory hallucinations and mental disorders, and medical conditions. Though these are common in the post-rock, space rock and avant experimental music scenes, Hovercraft's are likely bolstered by Campbell and Liebling's medical/scientific backgrounds. Haloperidol (sold as Aloperidin®, Bioperidolo®, Brotopon®, Dozic®, Einalon S®, Eukystol®, Haldol®, Halosten®, Keselan®, Linton®, Peluces®, Serenace®, Serenase®, Sigaperidol®) is a conventional butyrophenone antipsychotic drug. ... The vagus nerve (also called pneumogastric nerve or cranial nerve X) is the tenth of twelve paired cranial nerves, and is the only nerve that starts in the brainstem (within the medulla oblongata) and extends, through the jugular foramen, down below the head, to the abdomen. ... This article is about the syndrome. ... 1939 Benzedrine advertisement Benzedrine is the trade name of the racemic variant of amphetamine (dl-amphetamine). ... The term post-rock was coined by Simon Reynolds in issue 123 of The Wire (May 1994) to describe a sort of music using rock instrumentation for non-rock purposes, using guitars as facilitators of timbres and textures rather than riffs and powerchords. ... For space rocks, see asteroid. ... For experimental rock music, see experimental rock. ...

Recorded on two days in March and April of 1996, the ten-inch format of Stereo Specific Polymerization, also released on the Liebling-run Repellent, allowed for recordings that more closely approximated their live sound. In August, 1996, they appeared as a hidden track (often attributed to Monkeywrench) on the Germs tribute album A Small Circle of Friends; they contributed a 16-minute version of the song "Shutdown," allegedly recorded in the same Los Angeles garage where The Germs played.^{[citation needed]} After running the small club circuit of the North America a few times on their own, they supported Unwound on a European tour. The Germs are a punk rock band from Los Angeles in the late 1970s. ... // Unwound was a U.S. post-hardcore/ noise rock band based in Tumwater/Olympia, Washington. ...

Enter The Black Hole (Signing to Blast First)

In 1997 they were signed to Blast First Records in London by label head Paul Smith. In North America, debut album (released as double-LP and single CD) Akathisia was distributed by Mute Records America. Though Akathisia's liner notes credit "Karl 3-30", they also claim the album was "preserved and magnetically encoded 12.1995". Blast First is a noted sublabel of one time indie Mute Records. ... Paul Smith is probably best known as the founder and manager of Blast First, the British alternative record label that released artists such as Sonic Youth, the Butthole Surfers, Big Black and Dinosaur Jr. ... Mute Records is a record label formed in 1978 by Daniel Miller primarily to release his own single, T.V.O.D./Warm Leatherette, under the moniker The Normal. ...

The vinyl etchings on the four sides of Akathisia were as follows:

• Side A: "Do You..."
• Side B: "Dare To..."
• Side C: "Enter The..."
• Side D: "Black Hole?"

(This was the slogan of the cult classic 1980s Gottlieb pinball game, Black Hole.) Gottlieb (formerly D. Gottlieb & Co. ... Pinball is a type of coin-operated arcade game where a player attempts to score points by manipulating one or more metal balls on a playfield inside a glass covered case called a pinball machine. ... Black Hole was a pinball game released in 1981 by Gottlieb. ...

The new lineup toured with Japan's Kirihito and U.S. indie stalwarts, Caustic Resin, as well as taking the opening slot for a tour with Fugazi, after playing gigs with The Melvins, The Boredoms, and Sweet 75. (Like Dave Grohl, Krist Novoselic's first tour following Cobain's suicide featured Hovercraft.) An EP featuring remixes of two Akathisia songs by Scanner was released later in 1997. Caustic Resin is an indie rock band from Boise, Idaho, who have released several albums for Up Records, Alias Records, and C/Z Records. ... Fugazi may refer to: an Italian slang term for something that is fake/not authentic. ... The Melvins are an American rock band that usually perform as a trio. ... The Boredoms are a Japanese avant-garde band formed in 1986, whose wildly varied output is notoriously difficult to pidgeonhole. ... Album cover of Sweet 75s first and only album sweet 75 (1997). ... Krist Anthony Novoselic (born May 16, 1965) is an American rock musician best known as the bassist for Nirvana. ... Robin Rimbaud (born 1964 in Battersea, London, England) is an electronic musician who works under the name Scanner due to his use of cellphone and police scanners. ...

Final drummer, final album

1998 brought yet another change of drummer as Ric Peterson took the stool as "Dash 11". His much harder-hitting, visceral style was the apparent catalyst in the band's shift from ethereal 15-minute songs to more concise, angular arrangements. A track from the band's upcoming album, "Epoxy," first premiered for the world on Pearl Jam's "Monkeywrench Radio" broadcast, on January 31, 1998[3].

One year in the making, Hovercraft's final album, Experiment Below was released in September 1998.[4]. Hovercraft toured Europe again with Add N to (X), as well as played a number of one-off shows with Wire, Pavement, Hater, Mudhoney, and IQU. Bafflingly, Hovercraft opened for The Who at a short series of stadium concerts in the U.S. Northwest in late 1998. Add N to (X) were a three-piece British band specializing in electronic music performed on analogue synthesizers, formed in London in 1994. ... Wire are an English band formed in 1976 (and intermittently active to the present) by Graham Lewis (bass, vocals), Bruce Gilbert (guitar), Colin Newman (vocals, guitar) and Robert Gotobed (né Grey) (drums). ... Pavement was an American indie rock band in the 1990s. ... Hater was an American rock band from the 1990s, a side project mostly under the direction of Soundgarden bassist Ben Shepherd. ... Mudhoney is a grunge band, formed in Seattle in 1988. ... The Who are an English rock band formed in 1964. ...

Schema

Teaming up with Stereolab guitarist/ backing vocalist Mary Hansen, the band Schema was formed. Schema featured vocals and instrumentals in approximately equal measure, adding some synthesizer. An eponymous maxi-EP/mini-album[5][6] was released in 2000 on avant-garde Kill Rock Stars imprint, 5 Rue Christine. A second album and a tour was planned. However, while riding her bicycle in London on December 12, 2002, Hansen was struck by a truck and killed at age 36. Stereolab are an English-based band whose style, mixing 1950s-1960s pop and lounge music with the motorik beat of krautrock, was one of the first to which the term post-rock was applied. ... Mary Hansen (November 1, 1966 - December 9, 2002) was guitarist and singer with Stereolab. ... The new KRS logo by Sarah Utter on a KRS sweatshirt. ... 5 Rue Christine (also known as 5RC) is an Olympia, Washington based independent record label, formed as a spin off from the Kill Rock Stars label in 1997. ...

Hovercraft's last known live performance was on February 16, 2001, in Seattle.[7]

Hovercraft and DJ Spooky worked on remixes of each other's works in the late 1990s; two DJ Spooky remixes of Hovercraft were released, but Hovercraft's versions of his songs never were. DJ Spooky, That Subliminal Kid (born Paul D. Miller, 1970), is a Washington DC-born electronic and experimental hip hop musician whose work is often called illbient or trip hop. He is a turntablist and producer. ...

Hovercraft discography

Albums

• Akathisia - CD/2xLP (Blast First/ Mute, 1997) (apparently recorded in Dec. 1995, according to liner notes)
• Experiment Below - CD/LP (Blast First/ Mute, 1998)

EPs, Singles

• "Zero Zero Zero One" - 7" (Repellent, 1995) (recorded 1994)
• Hovercraft (a.k.a. Stereo Specific Polymerization) - 10" (Repellent, 1996)
• Scanner Remixes - CD EP/ 12" EP (Blast First/Mute, 1997)

Various-artist appearances

• "Shutdown Reprise" on A Small Circle of Friends (Germs tribute album) (Grass, 1996)
• "Angular Momentum" and Scanner's "De-Orbit Burn Remix" on Newman Passage (Mute, 1997)
• "Hymn" (feat. spoken word by Eddie Vedder) on Kerouac - Kicks, Joy, Darkness (Rykodisc, 1997)
• "Haloparidol" (short version) on Chicago Cab (a.k.a. Hellcab) soundtrack (Loosegroove [U.S]/ Play It Again Sam [U.K.], 1998)
• "Anthropod" on In Transit (split tour CD EP w/ Add N To (X) and Appliance) (Blast First/ Mute, circa 1999)

Video

• "0001" - VHS video single (Repellent, 1995)
• Band made brief appearance in movie Hype! (1996)

Hype! soundtrack album cover Hype! is a documentary directed by Doug Pray about the popularity of grunge music in the late 1980s and the early 1990s. ...

Schema discography

Albums

• Schema - CD/LP (5 Rue Christine [5RC], 2000)

External links

• Hovercraft database formerly known as The Aurora Lab; includes mp3 download of a live show