Hughes/Thrall was a one-off project consisting of vocalist/bassist Glenn Hughes and guitarist Pat Thrall which spawned a single, self-titled album released in 1982, combining melodic hard rock and a unique use of guitar sythesizers along with Hughes' powerful vocal style. It is considered one of the peaks of Glenn's post Deep Purple/Trapeze work. Hughes/Thrall was born in late 1981, and months of rehearsal, songwriting, and all around woodshedding followed in Los Angeles, where the duo eventually began recording an eponymous album with heavyweight producer Andy Johns (Led Zeppelin, Free), keyboard player Peter Schless, and a variety of drummers including Gary Ferguson, Gary Mallaber, and Frankie Banali (future Quiet Riot). The band hit the road with keyboardist Jesse Harms and drummer Tommy Aldridge (Black Oak Arkansas, Ozzy Osbourne, Whitesnake) in support of Santana, but their music seemed to slip into the wide gap between their heavy rock constituents and the oblivious pop market. Demos for a proposed second album were tentatively begun, but would have to wait until Rock Candy’s 2006 reissue of the Hughes/Thrall album to see the light of day, since, by 1983, the two men had split and moved on to other projects.
