CONWAY, Ark. (March 3, 2016) – The Uh Huhs, a garage punk band featuring former Hendrix College students, won this year’s Arkansas Times
Musicians Showcase at the Rev Room in Little Rock this weekend.
The band features former Hendrix students Zac Hale ’12 (bass VI, vocals), Zach Hunter ’09 (guitar, vocals), and Trent Whitehead ’12 (guitar, vocals).
Their prize package includes headlining spots at Valley of the Vapors, the Arkansas State Fair, Riverfest and Legends of Arkansas; gift certificates to Jacksonville Guitar, Blue Chair Studios, State of Mind Clothing and Trio's Restaurant; a photo shoot with the Arkansas Times' Brian Chilson; and a
celebration party and a personalized drink courtesy of Stickyz and Revolution.
Hunter’s earliest memories involve hearing the music his parents listened to, including The Beatles, Kinks, The Who, David Bowie, and The Rolling Stones.
“My mom had a VHS copy of The Who at the Isle of Wight festival, which is the first time in my life I can remember being in complete awe of something,” he said. “I got a guitar when I was 11 and pretty much lost interest in anything else.”
After talking about forming a group for months, the members began practicing and working on a few songs in 2014.
“We recorded two songs on an eight-track cassette recorder and stuck them up online for fun,” he said. “They ended up getting some radio play in Little Rock, and we just started playing shows in and out of town whenever everyone could.”
Hunter describes the band’s sound as “pop music with fuzz guitars,” and thinks that “the world would be a better place if more music sounded like the Jesus and Mary Chain.”
At Hendrix, Hunter, an international relations major, produced a four-song vinyl EP as an Odyssey project. The EP was released in the fall.
Hunter worked with Hendrix politics and international relations professor Dr. Daniel J. Whelan, who mixed and mastered the EP.
“Since the EP came out, the Uh Huhs have generated a great deal of interest in Little Rock and elsewhere,” said Whelan, who urged the band to enter the Musicians Showcase. “The Odyssey project was absolutely instrumental in making this all happen.”
Whelan is now working with Tsar Bomba, an indie rock band with Hendrix roots. Hendrix alumni Eric Schneider ’08 and James Szenher ’06 share songwriting duties and play a host of instruments.
Whelan is mixing and mastering a 16-track record the band recorded at Hunter’s home studio in 2012. The record is slated for release next year.
Though not a musician per se, Whelan taught himself to mix and master recordings by remixing late-period albums by The Beatles.
“This is my gardening,” Whelan said. “It’s my hobby.”
[UPDATE: Read about Dr. Whelan’s Beatles remix project in this
Arkansas Times article]
Hale, a former student of Whelan’s, asked Whelan to lend a hand on On Being
Alone, an album recorded in New Orleans, Louisiana, by Swampbird, another Hendrix band with Hendrix roots.
“The students knew I did that and they needed someone to master it, so they came to me,” Whelan said.
Some members of Swampbird joined Hunter for The Uh Huhs, and another Swampbird member had played in Tsar Bomba, which led to Whelan working with both groups.
“The guys met through Model UN and became friends,” he said. “They share a love of politics and public affairs.”
“They can write clever songs because they’re smart guys. They have interesting lyrics because they’re well read.”
“One of the things we try to instill in students at Hendrix is a multidimensional spirit of engagement, so a politics major can play bass guitar and sing in a band,” said Whelan, whose vision of a liberal arts graduate is someone who can pick up the Sunday New York Times and find something in
every section that interests them.
“For me, I get to be part of it too. I’m an IR scholar, but I get to mix music,” he said.
The Uh-Huhs are part of a community of successful Hendrix alumni who continue to play in bands even as they go to graduate school and the workplace.
For example, Hale is currently enrolled in a dual degree program at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Bowen School of Law and the Clinton School of Public Service. Whitehead works at a law firm and is planning on going to business school, and Hunter runs a
business making chassis for tube amplifiers and does technical service on equipment.
That community also includes Bombay Harambee, a band led by Alexander Jones ’11, recently released a new album. Alexander, a politics major and French minor, recently completed a law degree from University of Virginia.
Read more
The Arkansas
Times competition also included rockers Collin vs. Adam. The band features Collin Buchanan, a filmmaker and former Hendrix staff member, and Adam Hogg ’07.
Hogg, an accounting major, earned his master’s in accounting from Hendrix in 2008. Like Hunter, the Odyssey Program allowed Hogg to research music marketing and to record, manufacture, and sell an album he wrote with his band.
In addition to being the front man and pianist for Collin vs. Adam, Hogg is an accountant with DataPath, Inc., and is the developer of People-Person!, a strategy card game he released with the crowdfunding website Indiegogo.
“They reflect what we’re trying to do at Hendrix,” Whelan said. “They’re the liberal arts in action.”
[UPDATE: Check out The Uh Huhs’ new video directed by Chris
Jones ’12 and featuring band members Zac Hale ’12, Zac Hunter ’09, Trent
Whitehead ’12 along with actor Courtney Bass ’14.]
About Hendrix College
Hendrix College is a private liberal arts college in Conway, Arkansas. Founded in 1876 and affiliated with the United Methodist Church since 1884, Hendrix is featured in Colleges That Change Lives: 40 Schools That Will Change the Way You
Think about Colleges and is nationally recognized in numerous college guides, lists, and rankings for academic quality, community, innovation, and value. For more information, visit
www.hendrix.edu.