After landing on American shores in 2002 to study bluegrass, then shifting into a career as a country singer/songwriter/picker, Jedd Hughes has spent 20 years on an alternate – but rewarding – path as A-list session player and touring sideman.
While being busy tempered his flow of original music, in 2014, he returned to songwriting. His new solo album, Night Shades, is just his third, and was created with help from songwriter/performer/producer Rodney Crowell. More collaborative than 2019’s West, it’s also more personal. We chatted with Hughes as he prepped for a session with country star Eric Church.
How did the songs on Night Shades come together?
The same way I started West – at home, recording and building songs while writing. In the process, I was talking to Rodney quite a bit – we were writing together, as well – and there was so much material we were thinking of doing two records. Finally, I asked him to help me conceptualize the record and put a definitive list together. We added drums and bass – real humans – on top of tracks I built.
How were tracks sorted?
I let Rodney take the reins. He has such a great song sense, lyrically and melodically, and after 20 years of playing shows and working on records together, I really trust him with knowing my sensibilities and governing the quality of the songs.
How did you decide to cover Rodney’s “Stay, Don’t Be Cruel”?
That happened at his house. I was thinking it’d be great if we had one or two barnburners that would be fun to play live so we could stretch out. I couldn’t come up with anything, writing-wise, so he said, “Well, I’ve got this old song I wrote with Keith Sykes,” and he played it for me acoustically in his little studio. I was like, “Oh yeah, that’s got to be in there!” He and I were talking about Delaney and Bonnie, and Sarah Buxton has been a longtime close friend and collaborator, and he was like, “Why don’t we bring Sarah in and we can frame this thing as a Jedd and Sarah song?”
What’s the story behind “Kill My Blues”?
That was the second song I ever wrote with Guy Clark, about 20 years ago. It’s been sitting around, and I wanted to record it with a Bob Dylan Love And Theft vibe – small blues band, very live-feeling, with that ratty tone. I used a Greco Les Paul copy with mini humbuckers plugged straight into an Oahu amp, turned up. I wanted all the overdrive naturally out of the amp. That’s another thing I gleaned from working with Jeff Tweedy.
Talk about the acoustic sound you got on “Loving You Is The Only Way To Fly.”
That’s a really special ’38 Martin 0-18. I love its midrange. I can really articulate what I want with it, and it’s one of the better guitars to solo on and play rhythm in one pass.
You’ve mentioned being pleased with the way “Underground” turned out.
That was the most “built at home” track because I recorded the nylon-string part while I was writing it. On electric, I was going for two modalities – one really liquid, dreamy, and ambient, which was my old blue Teisco with square-pole pickups.
Yin to its yang was a Robbie Robertson dry electric sound; Rodney played one of Robbie’s solo records for me years ago – a song called “Unbound,” that has a great, raw electric sound. I had my Telecaster and played it straight into the GA-20 with a little dirtier tone.
Which nylon-string do we hear?
It’s a Del Vecchio that I really love. That guitar is instant music. It’s one of my favorites.
The guitar we hear most is one you built, right?
Yeah, during Covid.
Were you motivated simply by being on lockdown?
Well, when all the work went away at the beginning, I had to sell a bunch of stuff to keep us afloat – my ’57 Tele and a handful of other things. I thought, “I’ve had a ton of old Teles over the years and I could probably build something that would keep me going for awhile.”
We should touch on the new album’s acoustic ballad, “Day After Day.”
I wrote that after hearing of a friend’s sudden passing in Australia. It was very shocking, and that song is one of the few I’ve ever written that, as the words came out of my mouth and onto the page, didn’t go through any editing. It felt as real and guttural and raw as any song I’ve ever written. And I’m glad it made the cut, because it means a lot to me.
Which guitar do we hear on it?
I played that on a “banner” J-45 I borrowed from Rodney that belonged to a good friend of ours who passed on. – Ward Meeker
An extended version of this interview can be read at VintageGuitar.com.
This article originally appeared in VG’s June 2025 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
