"Here Now, Gone Again" an interview with Jack Clark of New Hues

New Hues are a rock n roll band based in Colombia Missouri. The groups latest release “Here Now, Gone Again” showcases the groups diverse batch of influences and introspective song structures.

I sat down with New Hues founder Jack Clark to talk about the bands early music musical experiences, how they got together and the making of “Here Now, Gone Again” which you can get here.

CMM-What was the first music that really made an impact on you all as kids and what artist or band did you all enjoy the most?

Jack-We all kind of come from different backgrounds musically, I personally grew up on lots of classic rock like AC/DC and Aerosmith, some newer stuff too like Foo Fighters and White Stripes those are some of the first few bands that made and impression on me, Metallica too and that goes for Nick (drummer) and John (bassist) they kinda grew up on the same stuff except as we grew older they went more of a metal direction and I got more experimental and punk. Kyren (second guitarist) had more of a singer songwriter upbringing with artists like the Beatles and Bob Dylan but also mixed with alternative rock bands like Nirvana and Modest Mouse.

CMM-When did you all first start playing instruments and eventually playing in your own bands and how did you all meet and start New Hues?

Jack-Kyren has been playing guitar and writing music the longest, probably since as he was old enough to remember he’s been doing it so this whole world of being a musician is pretty much all he knows. I didn’t start playing music until I was about 10 or 11 when I got my first guitar and I started teaching myself. John’s also been playing since he was about 10 or 11 but he’s actually a guitar player mainly, I always like it when you put a guitarist on bass though because they tend to play the bass like a guitar which is something I was really looking for when starting this project. Nick started playing drums in church when he was about 13 or so and quickly advanced to becoming and absolute powerhouse of drumming animalism. We all met in high school, Kyren, Nick, and I were in a band in high school called The Adaptation. We all ended up doing our own things for a little while after we graduated and now I’ve put us together for New Hues and we’ve been playing as this group since September of 2023, we officially formed in August but we didn’t have a bassist and we had another friend on drums but it didn’t work out. The four of us though are a dream team.

CMM-How does the band usually go about writing songs and recording? I see some of the tracks the band has released were recorded in a studio and some on a 4 rack. What are you all’s favorite parts of both of those processes?

Jack-With New Hues, I’ll usually write riffs or parts to the song and we’ll build off that together at practice, or we’ll end up improvising something that we like and it eventually becomes a song. Right now everything we have out I recorded alone in my home studio, I do it like that now mostly for convenience and costs sake since getting studio time can be so expensive nowadays and where we’re at we don’t have too many options for spaces so it makes everything a lot easier. I’ll just spend days or weekends on end in there working on it like a scientist in a lab or something I barely come out or socialize until I feel like I’ve made something I’m happy with. With the 4 track I use those mostly for demo tapes and ideas that I wanna record, it’s a little simpler to setup that’s why it’s my go to, the tracks we’ve put out from 4 track I just felt were good enough quality to go on our album. It’s definitely a fun process but it can be janky at times with it being older equipment and more minimal but that’s part of the charm.

CMM-If the band could do a score for any film director who would it be and what would the film be about?

Jack-We all really like Wes Anderson films so I would say probably him, the movie would probably be about space exploration or something like that.

CMM-What do you all have coming up next? Any new recordings or shows?

Jack-We’re in record label negotiations at the moment, we really want to have a vinyl release out by the end of the year it’ll probably be a 10 inch or something along those lines. We’re writing some new songs so you’ll probably see an Ep or two this year. Right now we’re trying to play more shows and get out there to play our album. We definitely want to get out of state more too.