Hugo James shares his music for anyone who may enjoy it. By day he is a translator, and by night he is a musician. He is the man behind the musical project The Good Thieves.
He is a singer and multi-instrumentalist who is classically trained, but was attracted to folk and world music in his youth, always preferring a folk-rock and folk-punk sound.
He was in various bands over the years, and with the downfall of not achieving his highest hopes this saw him becoming a gibbering wreck. This was punctuated by much total mayhem, but also travel, some professional and artistic successes in spite of everything, and some wonderful people.
The last 10-years have been a cycle of trying to get a grip of things, and during this time he has gained a lot of first-hand experience of living with people with serious, serious problems who have also been totally failed by society.
The Good Thieves is a musical project that emerged as an environment to try and express this brokenness that we have, and to reach out to others who are trying to fix it. And within his belief system, God is one of those others.
The idea of ‘The Good Thieves’ came about with the idea of the “Good Thief” is a character in the Gospel stories, who is described as being crucified on another cross to the right of where Jesus was being crucified. “Together with the “Bad Thief” (crucified to the left of Jesus), he was being punished for, well, thieving. But while the Bad Thief shouted abuse at Jesus, saying “You’re supposed to be the Son of God – save yourself and us”, the Good Thief rebuked the Bad Thief, saying “Have you no fear of God? We deserve our punishment, but this man has done no wrong. Jesus – remember me when you come into your kingdom,” he comments.
“I realised that, although there are some pretty nasty individuals out there, most of us are much more like “Good Thieves”, inasmuch as we might come from difficult backgrounds, engage in questionable behaviour, and generally not appear to be contributing to the sum total of human happiness in any way whatsoever – but we are still fundamentally good people, looking for a chance to help others and make the world a better place.”
Citing musical influences that people might have heard of, there would be The Pogues, The Men They Couldn’t Hang, The Oyster Band and The Levelers, and less prehistorically, Mumford and Sons and the Rend Collective. He is fascinated by traditional music from all cultures and countries from England (beautiful folk melodies), Spain (flamenco, sardana, trikitixa), Italy (tarantella), Eastern Europe (polkas and Jewish klezmer), indigenous music from various Latin American countries, and the multitude of styles found in Africa, from unaccompanied solo singing to full-blown Congolese rumba bands, with everything in between.
Discussing the musical inspiration from The Good Thieves’ debut album, None Shall Stand, there’s an Anglo-centric vibe drawing in predominantly English, Irish, and American folk-rock styles. “This is essentially because the melodic parts of the songs on the album have been churning around in my head for years – decades even – and had their genesis at a time when I mainly thought in those styles musically,” he comments.
The album consists of 10-tracks of prophetic biblical lyrical content set to what he thinks is powerful and catchy folk-rock. He released this essentially for people like himself, who want to express their religious faith through music, “but can take or leave the frankly all-a-bit-samey-and-lightweight material produced by a lot of Christian artists, and want something a bit more substantial,” he comments.
With an interesting musical catalog to date, The Good Thieves are driven to create music at one level for themselves, and have a strong desire to become as proficient as he possibly can at playing instruments, composing and arranging increasingly complex material beyond more straightforward songs, and using the electronic equipment that facilitates this. But on another level, he wants the music to be out there for people to enjoy with impact to continuously raise money and awareness for good causes, bringing people together where possible.
The Good Thieves are seen as a band with as many members wanting to join it, in whatever capacity Hugo mentions when closing out the interview, if you would like to contribute to this music collaborative project, email: thegoodthieves00@gmail.com.
Words by Danielle Holian