Hovercraft
Forgotten 90s No Wave Psychedelia
Known for their angular, delay-soaked compositions and throbbing rhythms, Hovercraft stood apart in a music scene as a true experiment in sound and perception that still defies easy categorization.
The band was founded in 1993 in Seattle by guitarist Ryan Shinn, who performs under the pseudonym "Campbell 2000"1, and bassist Beth Liebling, known as "Sadie 7" — and eventually joined by Bobby Tamkin on drums, adopting the stage name "Paul 4".
From the beginning, Hovercraft’s focus was on the music and the experience it creates, rather than the personalities behind it — which is presumably why members adopted stage names and performed lit only by a film projected on a screen behind them. Even their early promotional shots showed them only in silhouette.2
Hovercraft's music is a journey through experimental spaces, with influences ranging from free-jazz to early hardcore punk informing their more aggressive version of "space rock". Their soundscapes blend ethereal, 15-minute+ compositions with more concise, angular arrangements, offering listeners a unique interactive experience that's as much about the sounds being projected as the individual listener's interpretation and emotional response.
Their sound has often been described... differently by almost every person describing it — the only problem being: regardless of what was said, it usually kinda made sense. Some have called it "No Wave Psychedelia", or "Ambient Metal"... while others go with the more generic description of "Space Rock" — though, I generally think of something slightly more chilled-out when I hear that phrase, but it works.
Live Shows
Their live shows featured meticulously edited films created by guitarist Ryan Shinn that juxtaposed close-ups of insects with interstellar imagery, clouds, or vintage medical equipment and other mechanical devices — projected on and behind them, designed to immerse the audience in a multi-sensory experience.
In a 1996 interview with The Stranger, Shinn said, "There are about eight variations of the film and they're getting progressively more chaotic. The one thing they all have in common is the light bulb crashing at the end. It's edited so people get from it what they want. Some people see it as dark, others may think it's just eye candy, some think it's sexual. Not so much a message in there as the way it makes you feel".
Discography
Normally I would include a Spotify playlist, but Hovercraft doesn't appear to be on any streaming service. So, no playlist this time, you'll have to listen to the Youtube embeds below.
Zero Zero Zero One (1995)
The band's first release — a seven-inch single recorded in 1994 and released on their own Repellent Records. No track titles given, only the etchings "0001-A" and "0001-B". Given that it's their first release, and self-release at that, you can expect that it would be a little rougher than subsequent releases... and it is. But the most obvious difference between this and later recordings is how much less distortion and delay is being used — it's mostly just some reverb. Definitely makes the ”early Pink Floyd” comparisons make a little more sense, though. A lot rougher than the rest of their catalog, but the basics of what they'd become are here.
0001 (1995, VHS)
5-minute short film released in conjunction with their debut seven-inch in a plain black die-cut VHS sleeve with a sticker on the front: "0001 a short film by HOVERCRAFT" — originally sold only on tour, then later sold in Seattle-area record stores.
Hovercraft 10” EP (1996)
Hovercraft's second release, again on their own label, but this time on 10" vinyl. With this album, the band found their signature sound that they would spend the next few years perfecting. The EP is sometimes mistakenly referred to as "Stereo Specific Polymerization" — which is the title of the first track — the album is actually eponymous... or, as printed on the cassette sleeve, "hovercraft 10" EP". So, I'm not totally sure what the exact title is, but it's not "Stereo Specific Polymerization". This was their first new material with drummer Dave Krusen, dubbed Karl 3-30, who played on Pearl Jam's "Ten".
Akathisia (1997)
Their debut full-length album, released by Mute Records. While not a giant leap from their previous offering concept-wise, this album saw the band perfecting their signature sound and solidifying their presence in the experimental rock scene while moving beyond any controversy over their incredibly mainstream connections.
Experiment Below (1998)
The band’s second full-length album continued with their brand of experimental rock. This time with a new drummer, Ric Peterson as "Dash 11". Again, not a lot of new ground covered — the production is tighter, and there are some new sounds/textures introduced. Most of the songs are shorter, but beyond a few hard cuts, all the tracks blend together, so pointing out that they're shorter almost doesn't matter.
It's a great album, but because it feels like fine-tuning what they basically nailed on the previous album (and were building up to with the first 2 releases) without taking any real steps outside their established aesthetic, it seems a little redundant within the context of their discography. On its own it's perfectly fine — arguably better than "Akathisia" — but compared to the entire body of their work, it doesn't offer much new... which is a little odd considering "experiment" is right there in the album title… below.
Schema (2000)
A collaboration with Stereolab guitarist/backing vocalist Mary Hansen. With this release we finally see some drastic changes, but it's not actually to their sound... they changed their name. Perhaps the new name had something to do with record contract issues between Elektra (Stereolab’s label) and Hovercraft’s label Mute, but it's the same band, doing the same thing, with Mary Hansen adding vocals and some other electronic elements.
There are some interesting ideas, but it can sometimes sound like you're just listening to "Dots & Loops" at the same time as almost any Hovercraft album, occasionally pausing one of them. I like it, but it's the only "Hovercraft" album I don't listen to from start to finish. It felt more like a conceptual mash-up than a true collaboration — a missed opportunity considering all the ingredients for a noisier version of Bowery Electric’s “Beat” were right there.
This album is the closest thing to Hovercraft material on Spotify (also: Shinn & Liebling provide the soundtrack to a spoken word tribute to Jack Kerouac by Eddie Vedder).
While I'm talking about their discography, I should point out that during this time period there was another band named "Hovercraft" from Minneapolis — their album “Been Brained” sometimes gets included in the Seattle Hovercraft's discography. The Minneapolis band was kind of your run-of-the-mill mid-90s indie rock band that I don't know much about other than the fact they were eventually forced to change their name, becoming "Shatterproof" sometime around 1995.
Mainstream Connections
Anyone who knows anything about Hovercraft might have noticed that I kinda skipped over a little detail. Or not. I actually didn't know about it until years after they fell out of my normal rotation. Their bassist, Beth Liebling (Sadie 7), was married to Eddie Vedder from 1994-2000 — after dating since 1983. In fact, she moved from San Diego to Seattle in 19903 because he moved up there to join a band called… “Mookie Blaylock”.
Vedder also briefly joined Hovercraft as their drummer, using the stage name "Jerome230", during their 1995 tour with Mike Watt and the newly-formed Foo Fighters. He wore a wig to hide his face, but his identity was soon revealed and shows were starting to be crashed by crazed Pearl Jam fans, so he was replaced by Hovercraft's original drummer — Bobby Tamkin (Paul 4) — for the remainder of the tour. After the tour Dave Krusen took over and stayed with them until around 1998 using the name "Karl 3-30".
Despite attempts to link Hovercraft to the personal life of Beth Liebling, the band maintained a firm stance on focusing solely on their music. Though, Vedder’s brief stint as their drummer did often overshadow the band’s work in media coverage, which is understandable. It's the mid-90s, there's a band with no singer, no singles, no memorable hooks, barely any melody... but their bass player is married to the biggest [living] rock star of the moment and he plays drums with them sometimes. It shouldn't be a surprise that's the angle journalists took despite Eddie's mainstream fan-base probably not being into it at all.
Unit Shifter, Not So Radio-Friendly
The reality is, if there was any mainstream audience that was a good target for this band, it would have been the type of people who actually liked "Endless, Nameless" or “The Priest They Called Him” — not so much the people into "Better Man"... and back then those two demographics were pretty unlikely to overlap (I'm not sure how much they do in 2024, there’s still a bit of that Nirvana vs PJ thing around today).
Using ultra-mainstream connections to push a niche product probably isn't going to reach the people who would actually appreciate it, but it will move a few more units. And that's how you wind up with record shops that added a sticker saying "Featuring Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam!" to Hovercraft’s debut 7" EP "Zero Zero Zero One" — presumably behind the drums, but it didn't feature him at all. It was actually Bobby Tamkin (Paul 4), who also produced the EP.
Seeing as I was just starting my personal 80s phase around 1995, I was a bit oblivious to music journalism/marketing around then, so by the time I discovered Hovercraft in '97 the hype around the Vedder connection had died down enough that I actually knew nothing about it. I feel like this gave me a slightly purer introduction to them, without the added suspicion that it was just some pet project of a celebrity doing celebrity things.
The one criticism I would offer is that — even though I was a fan from the first time I saw them and like almost all of their material — they didn't have very much range. It was kinda too late by the time they switched it up a bit and added some vocals… which was fine, but didn't really change the dynamics enough to feel like a meaningful evolution.
I think these are probably the two main factors contributing to their absence from discussions about 90s music: their early marketing was to the wrong demographic and what little traction they did get was likely negated by not evolving their sound enough to be seen as more than a novelty act... so they kinda just disappeared.
Divorce/Break-up
There doesn't seem to be much information about exactly when or why Hovercraft broke up. Articles as late as 2000 give no indication of there being any issues in the band itself. They were happy with their latest drummer, and were apparently planning a second Schema album with Mary Hansen — which obviously didn't happen... but because the band broke up, not because of her death a couple years later.
The most detail I could find was "after Hovercraft ended around 2000, Liebling took a brief hiatus from music", and that their last performance was on February 16, 2001 — after being dormant since a string of 11 shows in October of 2000... the month after she divorced Eddie Vedder.
In a 2006 interview with Rolling Stone Vedder claimed the divorce devastated him, but he also started dating model Jill McCormic sometime in 2000. I haven't had to recover from ending a 17-year relationship, so I can't say one way or another if 3 months is a reasonable time to move on from something like that, but it’s possible that "in 2000" could mean before their divorce in September of 2000. If I had to guess, I’d say this might be the reason for the divorce... which led to the break-up.
Though, if we're being honest: the bass wasn't exactly the main focus of the band, nor that difficult to replicate. So, even if Beth didn't want to keep playing, there doesn't seem like there's any reason the band couldn't have continued. I can only assume that guitarist Ryan Shinn just didn't want to find a new bassist after playing with the same person for so long. If true, that's quite the contrast to Eddie's reaction.
Which might actually be a double-pseudonym. “Ryan Shinn” was sometimes referred to as “Ryan Campbell”, but there is no conclusive evidence explicitly confirming either name to be the real name of the person behind Campbell 2000.
While this might be too cynical of a take, keep reading and you might find there was likely a bigger reason for wanting to remain anonymous.
Both Beth Liebling & Eddie Vedder were originally from the Chicago area before moving to San Diego together around 1986 after high school.
BRILLIANT WORK. Why is this writer not being picked up by main stream media. He's head and shoulders above anyone writing about music out there. He intimidates me. HATS OFF TO YOU, NUK