One man's arrested development makes for another man's freakazoid moog-pop.

The Skinny
It's any given night of the week and you're sitting on your couch, frozen in permanent pointing-the-remote-at-the-TV position. Then you think: "I'd really like to see some weird, yet strangely attractive man reenact childhood bedroom fantasies on-stage. It would be preferable if he's wearing something really odd, like scuba gear, and making what can loosely be defined as music all by himself." No problem. Jody Hughes is your man. The former member of punk-rock outfit Catbox, Hughes is a kooky one-man outfit that defies categorization. Just go to hear his covers of Motley Crue's "Home Sweet Home" and Sonic Youth's "Kool Thing."
The Crowd
Those who think that Kraftwerk was too mainstream. —Melanie Haupt

From Citysearch.com

From SPACE CITY ROCK:

I have no idea, really, how to begin to describe this album. Local pop weirdo Jody Hughes has managed to assimilate all the Kraftwerkian sensibilities of the '70s, mix them all up with almost Crystal Method-like electronic noise, embellished it with some Peter Frampton touches (think "vocoder"), and create something totally bizarre. I can't claim that it's something new, mind you, mostly because Hughes seems to revel in the retro-ness of the whole thing, both in the music and the artwork. "Superman" is almost a tongue-in-cheek sendup of Laurie Anderson's 1982 opus "O Superman"...except that I think Hughes is completely serious, and that takes it from silly to just plain terrifying.
And y'know, I'm loving this. The overamped, almost crunchy synths, the robotic voice, the just-this-side-of-"lost it" lyrics, the pop culture references -- after the first bewildered listen, I've come to realize that this is fucking genius. The album builds steadily to its beautiful peak, the freaky fairy tale of "Walrus," which sounds like it could be Guided By Voices' Robert Pollard with a serious Darth Vader fixation. Just slightly less incredible is "Coca Cola (Daisy)," which transposes children's rhymes and an old folk song with gloomy electronic noodling and distorted vocals. The non-vocal tracks shine, as well, particularly "Torpedo Boat Destroyer" and "Nexuance" (the track that veers closest to Underworld of everything on here, by the way), even though several of them ("Truck," "Car," etc.) don't last long enough to make an impression.
To top it all off, about halfway through Hughes decides to have fun with other people's songs, as well: "Black Abba" turns Ozzy Osbourne-era Sabbath into Gary Numan; "Home Sweet Home" is a hopeful, steadily-quickening technological reworking of, yes, the Mötley Crüe "classic"; and "Dirty Boots" and "Kool Thing" are both Sonic Youth songs, redone to fit Hughes' twisted vision and seeming almost better for the transformation, if you can believe it (note, by the way, that I'm not a dedicated SY-head, so diehards, your mileage may vary). Final word: it's the sound of apocalypse, circa 1984. (Justin Hart)

Getting Sauza-ed

On June 30, Jody Hughes won a Sauza "Stay Pure" Award in the "Performing Arts" category. Jody is a tall, gawky guy with hair that looks as though he dyed it with black shoe polish. His performances involve dressing in tight costumes and flailing around with a microphone. Before the awards ceremony at DiverseWorks, organizers issued a press release in which Jody explained his work:
"Basically, I am a make-believe rock star. There are rules to movement on stage, dress, talk, manner for being a rock star. I use those. The only difference between me and other rock stars is, I am a real person."

From The Houston Press

From another article from The Houston Press

This past year Jody Hughes lived out the American dream -- well, the American dream for white boys approaching 30, weaned on sci-fi movies and video games and now working in computer graphics, that is. After serving tours of duty with such groups as defunct punk-rockers Catbox, Hughes broke out and became his own one-man synth-rock outfit. with quirky covers of Motley Crue's "Home Sweet Home" and Sonic Youth's "Kool Thing." But with all this techno skullduggery, one question remains: Is Jody Hughes really a novice living out his geek-rock dreams or an avant-garde artist just too damn hip for the room? Listen to his work and see if you get it or not. -- C.D.L.

In his own blisteringly ironic fashion, Hughes revisits the avant-garde posturing that helped create new wave back in the day. Using relatively obsolete equipment, such as analog synthesizers, Hughes composes experimental, utterly minimalist works that die-hard Kraftwerk fans would love. He revamps tunes from such unlikely sources as Black Sabbath, Motley Crue and Sonic Youth and turns them into tongue-in-cheek techno flukes, the kind of pop culture-saturated stuff teens of the '80s used to play on their Casios. He even finds a place to mix in the theme from The Rockford Files. (Cont.)

Art Rocker -- But Not Like Genesis
Heidi Klum is a supermodel. She poses in lingerie for Victoria's Secret, in bathing suits for Sports Illustrated and in minimal clothing anyplace else T-and-A like hers is welcome. She, in the belief of local art rocker Jody Hughes, is just the right kinda gal to appreciate his music. "I read in People magazine that she really liked Moby," says Hughes, referring to the one-man-sample-band. "My new year's resolution has been to think of myself more as a professional. So I'm going to send my CD to all my favorite celebrities." Which includes, among others, sending his work to Heidi Klum.
The CD Hughes mentions, his first, is almost finished. It's called Jody Hughes (self-released) and should be out later this month. The 16-track record is an attempt to capture Hughes's off-the-page sonic collage work, which is especially amazing live. Not just because Hughes, a relatively normal-looking character, goes through various costume changes on stage, nor because he bounces all over whatever club he happens to be playing, but because he manages to deliver a symphony's worth of electronic and sampled rock music all by himself.
"I see myself as a random person," he says. "But when I jump around on stage, I'd like to think people think, 'I can do that.' "Like the guy who performs in front of the mirror by himself," Hughes continues, "I do that on stage. I think people should be encouraged to do that."
As for People, Hughes doesn't want to just read it, he eventually wants to be in it: "I think celebrities have the ability to change the world. I mean, you gotta wonder what R.E.M.'s impact was on high school vegetarianism."