"We could see passengers hanging out over the hole" — Tony Hawkins, Dover RNLI Retired Coxswain

1 October 2018: Tony Hawkins talking to Jack Lowe about a very unusual call for the Dover lifeboat — the rescue of passengers from the Princess Margaret SRN4 Cross Channel hovercraft following a fatal collision with the harbour wall on 30th March 1985.

Postcards from the Coast: Tony Hawkins, Dover RNLI Retired Coxswain

The Fisherman's Dilemma

The Greatest Fisherman Who Never Learned To Swim

In navigation, a rhumb line, rhumb (/rʌm/), or loxodrome is an arc crossing all meridians of longitude at the same angle, that is, a path with constant azimuth (bearing as measured relative to true north). Navigation on a fixed course (i.e., steering the vessel to follow a constant cardinal direction) would result in a rhumb-line track.

The prompt for the Itch.IO game jam was: "Sail Away!"
And of course, punning on Captain Jack Sparrow's question.

SamāššEšrā

Where Has The Rhumb Gone? submission for WNCJ #11 hosted by emscottish for Itch.IO March 2025

Buy on Beatport

Where Has The Rhumb Gone? submission for WNCJ #11 hosted by emscottish for Itch.IO

This show has been inspired by the many folk who live on the canals. We look into the love and the hardship that is boat life. 

Graciously suggested by members of the London and K&A canal boat people.

Listen to the Blazing Sun #39 Boat Life

Siren

A game where you can play either as a pirate struggling to stay on board, or a siren luring unsuspecting pirates to their watery deaths. These are the loop tracks used in the game.

Siren Songs and Pirate Shanties

Piracy

Plastic Plant’s debut single, Mantis Shrimp, dives deep into the ocean’s mysteries, channeling the explosive power of one of nature’s fiercest creatures. Inspired by the shrimp’s superhuman vision and bone-crushing strike, the track blends fascination and fear into a vibrant, psychedelic soundscape.

Mantis Shrimp evolved through years of experimentation into a slow-burn earworm — a swirling mix of vibrato-drenched guitars, distorted riffs, and driving drum machine patterns punctuated by live drums — its offbeat tone and tidal rhythms evoking the eerie, hypnotic vibes of Ween’s The Mollusk, Peter Gabriel’s Melt, and Connan Mockasin’s Forever Dolphin Love.

Mantis Shrimp - Plastic Plant

1 April 2022: A chat with New Brighton RNLI lifeboat volunteer Mike Jones about his portrait on a gable end in his local town, recorded as part of The Lifeboat Station Project by Jack Lowe.

Read more here: https://lifeboatstationproject.com/new-brighton-revisited/

New Brighton's Lifeboat Mural

March 2022: A guided tour of Hoylake RNLI's state-of-the-art Shannon class lifeboat with Coxswain Howie Owen and retired Coxswain Davy Dodd.

Hoylake RNLI: Guided Tour of a Shannon Class Lifeboat

Zain on the synth, Lucca on the bass, together on the drum machine. Live jam.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drwpq0i2oO0

Buy it for a buck: https://swamp-magic.bandcamp.com/track/clamdigger

clamdigger

Power Sink (Original Game Soundtrack)

Charted Course

After hearing a recent song i got inspired to make this!

Sparrow

‘All for me grog’, ‘Good brown Ale and Tobacco’, ‘The Nobby Hat’, ‘This old hat of mine’ or ‘Across the Western plains/ocean’
 Grog is the affectionate nickname for watered down navy rum. This song was originally sung by sailors but the adapted to Irish folk and as all good sea shanty’s, it’s about which Is a sailor’s vice to get through the long voyage and what they’ll do when they get on shore. Basically, glorifying the life of a drinking, smoking, partying sea farer. ‘Noggin’ has several meanings, but in this context, it refers to a small mug or tankard and But it seems the sailors boots are being sacrificed to drink there grog from. Despite its many draw backs which are sang about in this song are sung with pride, because they are having too much fun and the tough life of a sailor deserves reward. The life of a sailor often means that when you get on shore and you get your pay, most of it is spent celebrating your survival from the harsh conditions, with the lassies of the public houses of the port town you happen to have landed in, drinking expensive gin after months of your rationed grog on deck.  It was collected by George Gardiner in 1906 from a sailor he knew and was then titled 'The Nobby Hat', Then James Madison Carpenter collected the version in 1928 as ' All for the Grog' And became a staple of Irish folk and pub music. In 1961, A L. Lloyd and Alf Edwards recorded the song on an ep under Topic Records. Then my personal favorite, the Irish rovers released it on their 'Drunken sailor' album And my first exposure to the song was a part of the assassins creed black flag sea shanties soundtrack released in 2013. When Britain captured Jamaica in 1655 the navy switched its sailor’s daily ration of French brandy to rum. Vice Admiral Sir Edward Vernon, Fought In the War of Jenkin's Ear on the side of the English against Spain. He was nicknames Old Grog because of an impressive grogram cloak he work in all weather (which was a coarse loosely woven fabric of silk and goat hair). In 1740 half the punishment dished out by the British Navy to their sailors involved drunkenness. 'Old Grog' issued an order that rum would be diluted with water, ½ pint rations, 6 hours apart. 

Folk PIrates

Christopher O’Hare (1867 - c. 1943) composed “Sea Song” in 1918 "for surf scenes, on the sea, sailors etc.” as part of Oliver Ditson’s “Music for the photoplay” series, intended to accompany movies in the silent era. It’s a late romantic theater orchestra composition — a rolling 12/8 time blizzard of arpeggios. Though brief, it could have been looped for longer scenes. 

Our recording started using Optical Music Recognition (OMR) applied to scans of the original copies of theater orchestra parts from 1918. The OMR product was edited in Dorico, assembled into a score and exported to Logic Pro to be recorded with sampled instruments. 

This piece was interpreted rather freely: the original organ part was mostly omitted, with the retained parts being performed by a synthetic choir. The low brass melody -- written for trombone - was recorded using a Euphonium sample.

The artwork is based on a Currier and Ives hand colored lithograph captioned “A squall off Cape Horn”. The print was originally published between 1840 and 1890. Library of Congress bookmark: https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/97514621/. 

Public Domain, No Rights Reserved.

Sea Song (Christopher O'Hare)

gangplank

John Philip Sousa composed Jack Tar in 1903, hoping this march might prove to be as popular as "The Stars and Stripes Forever". That was not to be, but it's a lively tribute to the the British sailing heritage nonetheless.

In spring of 2024 we used Optical Music Recognition (OMR) to transform the score into musicxml, and then edited and corrected the resulting product in Dorico Pro. Then we used sampled instruments to produce recordings of the individual parts and submixes of the band sections (woodwinds, low brass, etc.) All of these as well as the MIDI and musicxml files are freely available on the Internet Archive at: archive.org/details/InternetJukebox.JPS.62


Music produced by @MLucas.

Free to download and use as you wish. We hope you'll put these to work for your projects. Be creative, and don't hesitate to comment and ask questions. We'll answer if we can.

Public Domain. No Rights Reserved.

Jack Tar

Jack Tar (J. P. Sousa)

https://hyperfollow.com/TylerScottRenfro

My name is Tyler and I'm a Pacific Northwest based singer-songwriter with a love for music, writing and performing tunes on an acoustic with a few surprises thrown in for good measure. Thanks for listening.

Banner photo: Casey Barnett
Artist Photo: Ashleigh Spencer

A therapeutic journey into a mix of jazz, classical, and a blend of types of electronica.  And a wry, gradual observation that promotion tends to only go as far as you push it.  At least I make my fellow musicians laugh a little.

Active messenger in the metacrisis, documentarist, creator of The Lifeboat Station Project

"Orson works only one way and that way is HARD."-Nathan Raleigh. From his childhood room in France where he multitracked with 2 mono tape recorders for hours to the stages of NYC and Maine; from the streets of New Orleans and a squat in Loísaida to a lonely house at the end of a long dirt drive way in Maine, he has lived the better part of the last 25 years pregnant with songs. Songs that he relentlessly channels, carves, builds and bends into the soundtrack to your life.

DJ Doris produces radio shows. 
Gun of Sod produces music

Public Resource is a non-profit organization based in California. We believe universal access to human knowledge is the great promise of our time.

An emerging game and film composer, studying at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.

https://arabellajking.wixsite.com/website

New Jersey based singer/songwriter/producer, Joe Grisanzio has been creating for over 12 years. Over the course of the past year, Joe has begun to share covers and portions of original works on his TikTok and Instagram (both @joegrisanzio). His vocal stylings focus on pop and jazz, receiving classical vocal training since 2015. 

Fresh off of the release of his debut single "Sails", Joe is now finalizing his EP "Beach Boy", set to release in April of this year. This project showcases a combination of singer/songwriter, jazz, and beach pop influences. As a songwriter, Joe is currently developing several collaborations, of which he is the sole writer or co-writer for. 

Born and raised in New Jersey, Joe grew up soaking in a blend of AC/DC, Lady Gaga, Shirley Bassey, and Billy Joel, surrounded by rich music hubs such as Asbury Park and Princeton. These influences directly support his past, present, and future works.

New tracks tagged #nautical