Biography of Dennis Hughett | Guitarist of Shadow Life

dennis (aj) hughett: guitars

View my biography here and my music history below.

I began learning guitar, by ear, at the age of 12. Most of my learning technique has come from just listening to music and developiing techniques and ideas to write my own music. I've never been into learning what the artist is playing so much as drawing from the inspiration to write new music. I guess that's why I'm not all that big on cover songs.

Early in my music career, I began putting together a band called Theophilus with my cousin Keith Hames and some high school friends of ours. Theophilus was together for a while and over time some of the members changed. As things changed, so did our band name. The original founding members, who were myself and Keith changed the band name to Cloud Nine. Over time, our band name changed as often as our band members, music styles and sounds changed. We ended up with a band that eventually became known as Crosseyed Joe (or as some called us … CJ).

Crosseyed Joe was around quite a few years and shared the stage with a few regionally popular bands that were around our particular circuit at the time. Some of those bands were The Waiting and Small Town Poets (also previously known as Villanelle when we shared the stage with them) to list a couple. Crosseyed Joe broke up shortly before the turn of the century.

Over time, each band member of CJ went separate ways and joined different bands. During which time, I decided to start writing and recording my own material alone. Hoping to eventually start another band and have a foundation of material to add to with new members. I began a search for musicians.

During my search, I came across a vocalist, Johnny Key who had a band named Atomic Eyes (AE) that split up not long before we began chatting about the possibility of starting a band up together. Before long we had Atomic Eyes back together again with some old and new members (myself among the new). My relationship with AE lasted for a few years and I later parted ways with them as they continued on with member change ups.

Shortly after I parted ways with AE, a close friend of mine and drummer, David Fingerlos, whom I had been practicing with on and off for a few years encouraged me to start another band. And so, with his encouragement and support, I started Shadow Life (sLife). Shadow Life's first members were Dave Fingerlos and myself. Then, we began our search for a bassist and lead vocalist. Soon Shadow Life found its optimistically energetic friend and bass player Mike Sherman.

After a few unsuccessful years of searching for a lead vocalist for Shadow Life, Mike decided to pursue his Jazz interests and found another band to join and we encouraged him on the endeavor. With that, sLife needed another bassist and we found that in the ever-amazing Tim Petro. Tim was the perfect fit sLife. Now it was time to do more vocalist searching.

After another year of searching, we never found the vocalist we needed. Each of our personal lives were getting very busy, so we all decided to disband Shadow Life at the end of 2006.

Now, I'm pursuing a solo career. The goal now for me is to enter the journey of writing and recording music for the film and video game industries. There is still a lot to do to prepare for, which I'm currently in the middle of working on.

Question & Answers

What gear do I use?

Various 7-Strings & 6-Strings, Ibanez Acoustic Guitars, Line 6 PODxt, Crate Blue Voodoo 150w Lead Head, Ampeg 4x10 Cab, Shure PSM 200 In-Ear Monitor System, Shure Beta 58

Musical Influences » Bands:

Sevendust » Cold » Ra » Thornley » Tantric » Breaking Benjamin

Papa Roach » Kings X » Celldweller » Acceptance » POD

Musical Influences » Guitarists:

Paul Gilbert » Neal Schon » Eric Johnson » John Petrucci » Ty Tabor

Nuno Bettencourt » Ian Thornley » Joe Satriani » George Lynch

What am I listening to currently?

Family Force 5/Business up front, party in the back » Evergrey/Monday Morning Apocalpse » Papa Roach/The Paramour Sessions

Do I prefer performing, writing or recording?

All of it, but I've decided retired myself from performing live. I'm focusing on entering my writings/recordings into the film and video game industries. So far so good.

First band I was in?

Theophilus

One reason why I write and record music?

It's one of the things in life that makes me content.

What's something some people don't know about me?

My nickname (aj) was created from close friends of mine who say I look like the American version of what Jesus Christ looks like in pictures and paintings.

My Favorites

Local Bands/Artists: Johnny Key » UtraDrive » Copper » Paperstreet » State of Man » Soundevice » The Duke » Sevendust

Music: Dream Theater/Images & Words, Michael McDonald/Best Of

Movies: The Princess Bride, Oscar, My Cousin Vinny, many many more

Games: Most First Person Shooters

Books: No More Christian Nice Guy/Paul Coughlin
Wild at Heart/John Eldridge

Food: Anything my wife makes

Drink: Tea and Coffee

Current TV Show: Lost, The Office, Boston Legal, Heros, Two and a Half Men

Movie Genre: Comedies, Suspense/Thrillers, Some Adventure

Bands/Artists: Sevendust » Journey » Ian Moore » Mr. Big » Cold

Kenny Loggins » Dream Theater » Phil Collins