Singer Gary Hughes will be best known as the frontman for English band Ten, but over the years he has released a number of solo albums as well as writing and producing for other artists. On 12th March Frontiers Music released Gary’s latest solo album “Waterside” as well as a compilation of tracks from his earlier solo albums called “Decades”. I managed to grab a chat with Gary via Skype on 2nd March and we talked about the new albums, Ten and some other projects that he is working on.
That interview alongside four tracks from the two albums were featured on the Friday NI Rocks Show on 19th March 2021 and that Show is now on our MixCloud page -
https://www.mixcloud.com/NIRocks/interview-with-gary-hughes-from-ten-on-the-friday-ni-rocks-show-19th-march-2021/
The interview will be typed up and posted here later.
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Website - https://www.tenofficial.com/
Playlist for the Show
THIN LIZZY – Emerald
MAVERICK – Falling
MASON HILL – Broken Son
THUNDER – You’re Gonna Be My Girl
GARY HUGHES – Waterside
Interview with GARY HUGHES Part 1 (11 min)
GARY HUGHES – All At Once It Feels Like I Believe
Interview with GARY HUGHES Part 2 (10 min)
GARY HUGHES – In Your Eyes
Interview with GARY HUGHES Part 3 (12 min)
GARY HUGHES – Electra-Glide
TEN – Spellbound
THUNDERMOTHER – The Road Is Ours
BLACK DIAMONDS – Reaching for the Stars
SONIC HAVEN – Vagabond
HEART – What About Love
VIXEN – Love Is A Killer
BLACK STAR RIDERS – Kingdom of the Lost
ELECTRIC MOB – Higher Than Your Heels
SKARLETT RIOT – Stronger
SUMO CYCO – No Surrender
THE ANSWER – Preachin’
NI ROCKS – Hi Gary, thanks for taking some time to talk to us. Your new solo album “Waterside” is released by Frontiers Music on 12th March. We just played the title track which was also the first single from that album. What can you tell us about that track.
GARY – The track is based on an aspect of my early history as a late teenager – if you like – but it was also quite poignant to call the album “Waterside” because I’m here in the north of England; just north of Blackpool on the coast and maybe 40 minutes from the Lakes. So, because I live sort of surrounded almost by the waterside and the lakes, it seemed like a good title. And, also with the Ten material we tend to go very dark, and into gothic sometimes and into the literary aspect of things; whereas with the solo album I can just make it very simple – simple verse, simple set of songs – it’s just a simplified version. So, “Waterside” just seemed like a very simple, direct title really.
NI ROCKS – On the same date that you new solo album is released Frontiers are also releasing a compilation called “Decades” which we’ll chat about later. Focusing on “Waterside” for the moment, it has been about 14 years since the release of your last solo album. What made the time right for another album now?
GARY – I think it was more to do with lockdown really than anything else (laughs). We tend to prioritize the Ten albums and we’ve been quite productive and quite prolific over the past few years with Ten, and it’s just been a case really of when I have time to do a solo album. With prioritising, I have five or six other guys to consider, and it was one of those things where I’m just gleaning songs to one side that I think aren’t suitable for Ten and various different things and I get this stockpile of material. Every now and again I get the chance to put a set of those together and release it. Because it was so quiet during lockdown, literally because I couldn't have anyone over to record here; most of the stuff was programmed here, I could get one or two of the guys who could remotely record to add to this album, but that was about it really. It was a case of if you’re going to do something and make this time productive, you may as well do a solo record. So that is why now is as good as a time as any.
NI ROCKS – Make the best of a bad situation!
GARY – Yeah, totally!
NI ROCKS – You’ve a long history with Frontiers releasing your solo albums and the recent Ten albums. I suppose it a was a no-brainer to go to Frontiers. What has it been like working for them over the last load of years?
GARY – It’s been a lot better since we renewed our acquaintance with the. We’ve been with them since…our second album (“The Name of the Rose”) was the first Frontiers album – so we were Frontiers 01 if you like. We’ve had a long history with them, but it’s like anything else; and I have great respect for Serafino and Mario and the team there, who have been unchanged really for the past 25 years. But we’ve had our ups and downs as any band probably has had with any label that they’ve been with long term; but we had a short break where we did a couple of albums for Rocktopia, for Bruce Mee’s label. That was a situation where it was kind of a little bit acrimonious when we left Frontiers, but after a couple of productive years doing the Rocktopia thing, Bruce himself when he was closing it put the feelers out to Serafino so that we could rejoin Frontiers. So it was quite a strange situation and since we’ve rejoined, in fairness we’ve had some productive years where we’ve done “Gothica” and “Illuminati” quick off the bat. They’re more relaxed with us now and don’t sweat the small stuff that they used to do. I think as well probably, if I’m honest, we don’t either; because we were kind of a little bit uptight at the time as well. That tends to happen in a relationship with a label and a band. If one side starts to get fractious, I think it’s easy for the other side to get fractious too. So we don’t sweat the small stuff, they don’t; and it seems to be a lot more chilled and I would say that we probably get on with the label better than we ever have in 25 years. So that’s a good thing.
NI ROCKS – You mentioned that a lot of the album was recorded remotely. Who else is playing on the album with you?
GARY – Just the two guys from Ten – Darrel Treece-Birch and Dann Rosingana. I did an album in the middle of last year – just between the first lockdown and the second lockdown; if that makes any sense – with a brand new trio that we’re formulating label inroads for called Tao, who are a female fronted trio. Dann’s brother Dave Rosingana plays bass with them. It made sense because I’d just come off the back of recording with him to ask if he wanted to do the bass on the record. And Darrel actually played drums – Darrel our keyboard player from Ten actually played the drums as he is actually quite a fine drummer as well. He has the space to be able to record the drums where he is, so he did those in lockdown as well. It was an eclectic mix of musicians on the album this time. Some backing vocals from Karen Fell who is also the lead vocalist for Tao, the band we were talking about. I even managed to get my son (Scott), who is quite musical as well and is just finishing off some recordings with an LA based producer called Jeff Sojka and his style is a lot more pop orientated, more chart orientated. But he had a song, “Screaming in the Half Light” which I suppose if I’m honest is his song really. I said to him why don’t we do that one on my record and it was great for us to be able to do something together. We have very similar timbres with our voices and it was nice to do a duet on that basis and work on it in that way. And to do something with my son, which is the type of thing I could definitely do on a solo record, but wouldn’t dream of on a Ten one when you’re considering other guys. It’s completely self-indulgent on a solo record.
NI ROCKS – You mentioned writing earlier on, but when did writing actually start for the new album and how does the writing process differ when writing for yourself and writing for Ten?
GARY – I think it’s exactly the same to be honest with you. The only difference is; because I write all the time I have one of these little almost like the old walkie-talkie, a little Dictaphone thing that records MP3s and I carry that with me all the time. I come up with strange inspirations at strange times of the night and day. Middle of the night when you’re getting up for the loo and you’re suddenly struck by inspiration! It’s that kind of thing; but because I do that I stockpile huge amounts of verses, choruses, ideas, melodies and chord ideas on these machines. And instantly I know whether something is going to be suitable to develop as a Ten song or whether its not. The solo stuff just comes out of songs that have been archived, because they weren’t suitable for Ten. I’ve quite an interesting time going through some of those and finding a batch of songs that would be suitable for a solo record.
NI ROCKS – Obviously we’re still in the midst of Covid, although it might be on the way out thankfully. Are there any plans to play some live shows in support of the album at some stage?
GARY – Hopefully; it’s a strange thing at the moment isn’t it. People are almost frightened to say we’re going to book some shows. But, let’s make no bones about it, it’ll all come back at some point and we’ll get back to something that, even if it’s not the same as it was before it’ll be something akin to what it was. In the meantime it’s just a case of using the time productively and making sure you stay in the public eye in one way, shape or form. I mean I’d love to do that. To be honest with you it’s one of my ambitions now. We’ve done a lot of studio records and we’ve even done live records, but we’ve never done a DVD and I would love for the band to have a DVD just to fill that last blank of the jigsaw of what we’ve got available. But again, you have to be able to do shows to be able to do that so we’ll just have to see. Yeah, it’s definitely part of the game-plan to get out there and do some shows because it has been a while since we did a collection of shows in promotion of any particular album. We have done a fair few festivals over the last few years and working on the basis that you can play to a lot more people at a festival than you can on five or six dates on a tour. But it would be nice to get back out into the venues and do something that was just a little bit more intimate and a little bit more closer and sweaty and work it that way. So, who knows, it’s something that we’d love to do but at the moment, as you said, it’s very much watch this space as far as covid allows.
NI ROCKS – We’ll play another track from the “Waterside” album now. Do you want to pick a track this time and tell us something about it?
GARY – Yeah, “All at Once it Feels Like I Believe”. I put it on the solo record and it’s very unusual for me to kick off an album with a ballad; but I thought, I’ve never done it before so I’ll do it this time. It was a song from a few years back when I had developed a relationship with Warner Chappell Music who are our publishers and they were asking me if I had any material that was suitable for anybody else. I had a collection of songs that had been bandied about and various different people were looking at potentially recording different versions of them. This was one that was never picked up on, but I was hearing that anybody from Chicago to anybody else recording this song, but it wasn’t quite hard enough for Ten. I still felt it was a great song and as far as melody, chord and lyrical aspects were concerned it’s probably one of the strongest on the record. For me, it would be a nice one to play.
NI ROCKS – We mentioned earlier that Frontiers are also releasing a new solo best of album called “Decades” on 12th March. The collection covers all your solo albums, not just those on the Frontiers label. Was that something that you were able to agree on from the start? That it was going to cover everything and not just Frontiers?
GARY – Yes, it was a strange thing really. There was one album, well I say one album; my very first album “Big Bad Wolf” that became “Strength of Heart” was kind of released three times. Because it came out on Polygram in Scandinavian territories as “Big Bad Wolf” and then it came out again there as “Strength of Heart” when we added some singles to it – I had a little bit of success on the singles charts over there – and then it was reissued by EMI Electrola in ’92 or ’93. But there was a massive legal case that followed up because the management company that I was with basically signed the songs to their own publishing company without my consent. It was one of these lingering legal battles that was just on the brink of going to court when everything was sorted out between the lawyers. My lawyer said to me basically you’re going to win this case, but you’ve then got to consider that they may then counter-sue for the money that they have spend recording the album; so you’ve got to work out whether the album has made more than it cost to record. At that point I had absolutely no idea about sales and how it had done because it had been released three times. It was kinda left floundering in the water and there’s not, even to this day, anything that I can do about the publishing on those particular tracks. So those were purposely not included because basically I wasn’t prepared to make money for a company that had basically hung me out to dry way back then.
So, it is a little bit incomplete in a lot of ways and the reason that they went for a double CD was that just recently they had done “Opera Omnia” thing for Ten where they basically crammed all 14 studio records and a double live album into one box. And they were originally going to do that with my solo material as well, but it just occurred to me that, when it’s not as prolific as the Ten count, when you’re looking at 5 or 6 albums, I figure that most people who are into your music will probably already have got those albums anyway; so why wouldn’t we try and do something that is a little bit more collectable for the fans. I thought a double CD would be great because we can cram it full with as much music as I can get on there. I can remaster them a little bit ; there’s a instant issue with material that was written and recorded in the early 90’s, and playing it alongside something that was recorded in 2008 or something. So you have to be very creative with the EQs and various different shelving compressors or whatever; but I think that, at the end of the day, we made it sound right like it all belonged together. The main thing for me on “Decades” was, if we were going to give them something, lets cram as many… and I was asking questions like how many tracks can we get – what is the red book on CD – like 84 minutes or whatever. I think we crammed 30 odd tracks on there and I’m quite please about that, because if nothing else it’s value for money definitely. I think anybody listening to that is pretty much got an honest, open book view of what I’ve done over the years. I’m quite pleased with it.
NI ROCKS – The “Decades” collection obviously includes some of the tracks that you sang on the “Once and Future Kings” albums but a lot of those songs were sang by singers - Bob Catley, Danny Vaughn etc. Those rock opera albums go back to 2003. Are we likely to see something similar being released anytime soon?
GARY – To be honest with you, that was something I really loved doing in that period of time when I was writing for all those other voices. It was really inspiring because it opens a complete pandoras box of things that you can just go for. You listen to people, and as we say the timbre of people’s voices, the camber, different pitches; and it opens up a whole new spectrum of things you can do with music for other people and their voices. I really enjoyed that. Unfortunately, when it came to “Decades” I wanted to include some songs on there, but the label…I love the stuff that Sean Harris does on there for me and I love what DC Cooper did, Danny Vaughn… and they were like, but you’re basically putting out a ‘best of’ out here and you really have to pick the songs that you sing (laughs). So the songs that I picked from “Future Kings” are not necessarily my favourite ones on there; they’re just literally the ones that I sang on there really. I’d love to do that again. I had a couple of concepts on the go to follow up the “Once and Future Kings” situation, but the focus went away from that a little bit and it became a little bit unpopular. Or at least, Frontiers at the time decided that they weren’t really going to invest in another rock opera, another type of thing. Although, it was ironic, that at the same time they were talking about trying to get the “Once and Future Kings” albums into the live situation, where we could put a band around it and get the singers over to do it; Tobias Sammet launched to astronomical success with Avantasia. I was like, oh my god I’ve been going on about this for years and they were – ‘no, it’s never going to make money, it’s not worth putting money into and then that happens. So, I don’t know; I’d love to do that again at some point, but it does take a lot of investment and you’re balancing, spinning a lot of plates when you do that type of album because there are a lot of artists and a lot of schedules involved. But, I’d love to do it again if we got a chance to – but who knows. If in the future the opportunities arise I’ll take them.
NI ROCKS – In terms of singers is there anybody who you like to work with?
GARY – Oh yeah! I’ve got a list as long as my arm. Some of my heroes I would love to work with. I’d love to work with John Waite, I’d love to work with Coverdale who is a bit of an idol. I’d love to work with Anna Wilson, I think she’s got it. Just quality voices – people who are unparalleled in their sphere, in their particular style. So, there’s loads of people I’d love to work with, and also its nice of in that kind of thing; if I did one again I’d like to give some fledgling singers a go as well; to try and bring some people forward if we could. It’s nice to hear new talent emerge from things like that. But, you never know.
NI ROCKS – There is a great album cover for “Decades” – almost a Ten type cover - who was responsible for the artwork on that?
GARY – It was a strange thing, because we had the dragon that was done by a Russian artist, whose name I cannot announce even to this day and he has a very English pseudonym that he works under, but it’s not his real name. He has been sending through the website little bits of art that he has done over the years for some time. Again, it must be nearly ten years old that dragon aspect of the picture – he sent it to me years ago and I said ask Oleg if he is still into the idea of me using something and if he is we’ll use it. But because it was a pencil drawing on a white cover I had to superimpose it onto something so that’s actually two pictures. It’s actually the dragon superimposed over a landscape photographer’s photograph. It works quite well; but if you look really closely you can see the difference. It works well together and it almost makes the dragon seem like it comes forward out of the picture. It was just something that I’d really liked and had lying around for a lot of years and thought I must get that on a cover; even if it’s not in it’s original format.
NI ROCKS – We’ll play something from “Decades” now. There are plenty to choose from – there are 29 tracks. Do you want to pick a track and tell us why you’d pick that one?
GARY – I’d probably pick “In Your Eyes” off “Precious Ones” because it’s very commercial and make fairly good radio airplay. It was at a time when that particular album was very commercial; lots of aspects of that were commercial. And because I picked a ballad before from “Waterside”, then maybe we’ll go with this more commercial and mid-tempo track – “In Your Eyes”.