Hovercraft on David Marsden

Thu, 25 Dec 2025 11:33:00 +0100

The antidote to Xmas singles you didn’t know you needed.

Merry Xmas Everybody

Sat, 13 Dec 2025 14:59:00 +0100

…these are great songs… Poetic, mystical, and marvellous… songs that should have been hits in any era of modern music.

One of many amazing reviews of hovercraft’s new album Blown Away.

Fri, 28 Nov 2025 23:33:00 +0100

Hovercraft release Black Friday anti-Christmas single double A-side Christmas single. Hot off the uploads. Get it while you still can.

Fri, 21 Nov 2025 23:08:00 +0100

New album available for pre-orders.

Thu, 20 Nov 2025 19:01:00 +0100

Another great review: “disco, rnb, folk, pop, indie, rock, blues, country, alternative dance…” Take your pick!

Thu, 20 Nov 2025 01:46:00 +0100

Now That’s What I Call A Music Review!

Tue, 04 Nov 2025 23:30:00 +0100

Shaken Not Stirred now available on Bandcamp, if you’re that way inclined.*

*We promise not to spend any of the profits funding arms dealers or weapons manufacturers.

Tue, 28 Oct 2025 12:52:00 +0100

This a is a really impressive review of my resurrected old band’s debut album.

“The way Shaken Not Stirred seamlessly merges the essence of the 60s all the way through the decades to today with contemporary sounds is nothing short of magical, this is a fusion of genres that feels entirely new, yet familiar. “Crazy Over You” is an absolute winner in every sense, a perfect opener that hooks you right from the first beat.”

Sat, 18 Oct 2025 09:03:21 +0100

Cracking review!

Mon, 13 Oct 2025 19:53:50 +0100

“Shaken Not Stirred is more than an album—it’s resurrection art.”

Fri, 10 Oct 2025 14:51:04 +0100

Shaken Not Stirred.

Mon, 29 Sep 2025 09:56:30 +0100

New single released, only thirty years after we first recorded it.

Fri, 26 Sep 2025 14:58:58 +0100

Help me find my old bandmate and songwriter.

Fri, 15 Aug 2025 17:03:04 +0100

Thu, 07 Aug 2025 08:20:07 +0100

“We might live in a world where critics of AI are the loudest, but songs like this quietly and powerfully prove them wrong.”

Fri, 01 Aug 2025 00:04:40 +0100

Higher Ground.

Sun, 27 Jul 2025 20:52:12 +0100

Google NotebookLM podcast “deep dive” on my AI music restoration project and the democratisation of creativity (which I hadn’t thought about).

Transcript

Digging the Lost Tapes Restoration of Grimsby's No. 1 Band in 1996

Sun, 27 Jul 2025 19:55:24 +0100

Hovercraft (UK) were a real live band, briefly, in 1995-96.

We hovered in, made a lot of noise, broke down and sank without a trace, all in the space of nine months.

We were number one in the first, and possibly only, South Bank Demo Charts in the Grimsby Evening Telegraph.

There’s no chance of a reunion. That will be a relief to many. Our drummer emigrated to Australia. Our singer-songwriter-lead guitarist is MIA, last seen in India (or Boscombe). Our bass player plays in a semi-professional covers band. And our guitarist/tech guy is me.

Every few years I get out the digitised versions of all our old demo and home recording tapes and remix and (re)master them with the he latest free tools available. In the early days, that was Audacity. More recently, it’s Soundcloud’s and Bandlab’s (free) online mastering tools.

The goal is always the same. To transform the lofi, degraded analog recordings preserved on mangled old cassette tapes that were digitised using the cheapest USB analog to digital converter tape deck available twelve or fifteen years ago into something resembling what we actually sounded like in our rehearsal room, the studio, the pub, and - most importantly - in our own imaginations. (If you’re interested in learning more about mastering and how Bandlab mastering works there’s a couple of good articles here.)

Last October I went down the same old nostalgia rabbit-hole. Every time I think I’ve made the tracks sound better with the latest software, which usually means adding reverb or preset effects (which are likely a mixture of reverb and compression). The end result is something which sounds a bit louder, more atmospheric and less rough around the edges. Although all the reverb and compression can also make for a lot of additional noise, when noise is an integral part of the original sound AND the degradation of the original sound that was digitised.

Anyway, it’s all a bit of fun and allows for reconnecting with Ron Nasty, our old bass man (now known as Ronnie Nice). Ronnie and me had a lot of fun writing the band’s not entirely factual or unelaborated back story. Putting that into Claude.ai produced more amusing results, as did giving it some of the lyrics to the songs. These AIs can make pretty good music critics if you tell them that’s what they are, even if they’ve never heard a note. Claude is now like the fifth Beatle.

And that was what got me thinking… Can AI listen to music? That’s how I discovered Suno Music, Microsoft’s online AI music creation beast. And it is a beast. (Other beasts are available.) Me and Ron started off simply pasting in lyrics to the songs Ron had lovingly transcribed by listening to the old songs over and over again (only the other day I realised I had some of the original lyric sheets, but don’t tell Ron). Click on and Suno will produce three minutes of sophisticated sounding rock or pop that you can start listening back to in a matter of seconds. It’s highly addictive. You can add music style tags (folk, blues, punk, etc.) and even general instructions to generate a particular sound (“Indian sounding funeral dirge”) that you like. This technique created what I called Hovercraft Reimagined.

That was back in March. The originals, if you wanna listen.

Then I realised you could (then) upload and use two minutes of original audio. Not quite a recreation or restoration of the original songs, but getting close. We also enjoyed doing an album of Hovercraft songs as if covered by a female singer in a more chillout style.

Finally (!), Suno v4.5 now allows up to eight minutes of uploaded audio. Frustratingly, I haven’t been able to recreate some songs at all (Mr Tooting Brown seems impossible), and still the AI seems to insist on missing out intros, outros, middle bits, solos, lead guitar work. But it’s getting a lot closer to an actual recreation of the original songs and band sound and style.

We also had fun generating song and album covers with ChatGPT.

Lastly, to reiterate, all of the songs bar the originals were created using Suno. Most of the later ones I downloaded the stems, uploaded them to Bandlab and remixed and mastered them there, before uploading to Bandcamp.

I’m not expecting anyone to listen to any or all of this, but hope it’s a useful contribution for anyone wondering what or how to go about a similar restoration project, or indeed, to create your own new songs (I’ve also done a few of those, too). Some people are pretty sceptical about AI generated art, and that’s fair enough. But this has been tremendous fun, and it’s great for me, Ron and everyone else who remembers our band to be able to recreate, restore, produce and hear the old songs again in a way that doesn’t hurt the ears so much.

While it was never the original “plan”, we’re now looking at releasing tracks through Bandlab’s distribution service, and reworking some of the songs to make them poppier and more accessible to a wider audience. And we’re looking for Charlie Pepper. Last heard of in the Bournemouth area ten years ago.

We should put a card in the local Spar shop window: “Chilled out lamppost wanted to front retro space pop band”. That should do it.

I Got My Mojo Workin'

Sat, 19 Jul 2025 20:32:50 +0100

Hovercraft’s electrifying take on Muddy Waters' blues standard, transforming the Chicago classic into something distinctly their own while maintaining its essential swagger. The band stretches the familiar structure through strategic lyrical modifications and extended repetitive passages that push the song into hypnotic territory.

Recorded during their brief but intense 1995-96 existence, this version captures the raw energy that made their live performances so compelling. The 4-track intimacy brings the listener right into the room with the band, making the blues feel immediate and urgent rather than reverential.

Fri, 18 Jul 2025 22:21:46 +0100

Hovercraft’s most ambitious and psychologically complex composition, this two-part epic traces the complete arc from deification to self-destruction. Beginning with “Now You’re God,” the song examines the toxic relationship between celebrity worship and personal identity, building through religious imagery and maternal prayers to the devastating conclusion of “Dying Comes So Easy.”

The haunting “frozen eye” imagery and repeated maternal prayers (“Pray for your son mama”) create hypnotic passages that mirror 📷obsessive thought patterns, while the religious symbolism elevates personal trauma to mythic proportions. The progression from external worship to internal destruction reveals the cruel mathematics of celebrity culture.

Sun, 13 Jul 2025 14:31:11 +0100

Every song needs a pulse 📷. Every moment needs a heartbeat. Shimble’s rhythm keeping time with a generation’s hopes and fears, 1996.

The beat lives on: Re:Creation 🥁

Mon, 07 Jul 2025 21:16:18 +0100

Confessions of a failed pop star.

Tue, 01 Jul 2025 21:00:04 +0100

Say what you like about AI, but it’s brought my old band back to life. Whether that’s a sweet thing is another matter.

Tue, 27 May 2025 11:14:26 +0100

My head is shot, my teeth are rot…

Had a few jars with my old band’s bass player last night.

Tue, 20 May 2025 19:10:59 +0100

I listened to your feedback.

“TOO LOUD!!!” you shouted above the din. Or was it “TURN IT DOWN!!!”?

Whatever it was, we listened, and thirty years later we created the easy listening Hovercraft, for those of you, like us, who are getting on a bit and just want to chill out.

13 of the Craft’s finest homebrew, a bit hazy now, but super strength, just how we (used to) like it.

🎵 Chilled Out Lamppost Wanted by Hovercraft (UK) on Bandcamp

From The Rehab To The Refurb

Sun, 18 May 2025 20:20:03 +0100

30 (it feels like) 35 years after Charlie Pepper took the first train out town on the morning after England’s semi-final defeat to Germany, Hovercraft have virtually reunited to perform, and record their greatest non-hits.

“Sir” Gareth Southgate’s penalty shootout miss heralded a new era of failure for Ingerland’s golden generation, and it heralded the end of the road for Hovercraft before we’d even got out on the highway.

A missed opportunity, and it’s too late, it’s still too late, to do anything about it now, of course.

Thanks to the wonders of new technology, and burning through enough clean water to keep a small town hydrated for over a year, we’re able to produce for your listening pleasure a recreation of some of our favourite tunes.

There’s a few intros, outros, middle bits and various other things missing, and some unexpected new additions, but overall I think the songs here generally keep then essence of the band and the spirit of the songs. And they’re easier to listen to than our mangled old tapes converted to digital and overly compressed.

🎵 From The Rehab To The Refurb by Hovercraft (UK) on Bandcamp

Thu, 08 May 2025 15:14:44 +0100

Now You’re God / Dying Comes So Easy recreated in full. Original here.

Sun, 27 Apr 2025 16:08:26 +0100

Ended up going down an AI music creation rabbit hole. Hovercraft Reimagined.

Sun, 27 Apr 2025 15:56:09 +0100

Finally got around to uploading some of my old band Hovercraft’s music to Bandcamp.