Motown loving, spicy-food-eating, duet singing, hair champions, pop duo Honey and Jude are bringing something that’s ‘twice as nice’ to the musical world of teens, pre-teens, and excitable soccer moms.
Born and raised in Southern California, Honey and Jude are so LA, it’s silly. Like something right out of Grease, their Danny and Sandy- esque charm keeps things fun and fresh at their LA-area shows.
The release of their debut EP, Summer Fling: Don’t Mean a Thing (2015) has been well received, gaining attention most notably from Music Connection Magazine, who named Honey and Jude in their “Top 100 Unsigned Artists of 2015.”
The repertoire ranges from bittersweet ballads that nod towards a 50’s era sound in “Not Worth a Song” and the dramatic “I Need You” to edgier songs that make being bad feel right in “Wrong.” And it wouldn’t be Honey and Jude without the over-the-top popalicious anthems like “The Lucky One” and “My Stupid Songs.”
Honey and Jude have collectively played several notable venues such as Hard Rock Cafe, House of Blues, The Foundation Room, and more.
In this interview spotlight, we have a virtual pow wow with this dynamic duo to discuss the new project, their influences, and more.
Full Q&A as well as links and a stream of Weirdos and Freaks available below.
Let’s dive a little deeper into Honey and Jude, the artist and music. What attracted you to this genre or style?
Jude – For me, I’ve just always been a huge fan of melody. I love our gen-re of music because the melody is a big part of it. And we try to throw in a little spice of throwback 50’s to a lot of our songs, which I also love. I think the music from the 50’s and 60’s is the best music we have ever had in popular music; there’s just something timeless about it for me. I can never quite get tired of it.
Honey – I think what I love about pop is that it’s universal. Pop songs takes a little something from many different genres, so even for music fans that don’t like all mainstream pop, there’s always that one pop song that they love.
How long have you been creating and sharing your music with the public?
J – I have been creating and sharing music for about four years, but Hon-ey and I started creating our own music together one year and a half ago. It seems like a lot longer because so much has happened in that short time, but in the grand scheme of things, it hasn’t been all that long.
H – I have been writing songs since high school, but the Honey and Jude EP was my first introduction to the public as a singer and a songwriter.
Who or what influences your playing and/or writing? Also, what mo-tivates you to keep going?
J – I find myself influenced accidentally a lot in my writing. We’ll finish writ-ing a song and then realize the song has hints of another song I happen to like. I guess every musician goes through that. We call them happy ac-cidents.
Overall, I take influence from groups like the Temptations, the All-American Rejects, Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, and Bruno Mars.
Being motivated to keep going is the single hardest part of the job! I know so many musicians who have all the talent in the world, but gave up be-cause things got rough. The struggle is real when you’re living in LA, try-ing to pay rent, and still support your music career. I keep myself going because I know that if I don’t give it everything I have right now, I will be a bitter old man who hates the world… probably. Also, I have a good sup-port system around me, which makes a big difference.
H – I find that my emotions influence my writing a lot. Whenever we sit down to write a song, I use whatever I’m feeling that day and channel it into what we write.
But music influence wise, I love the writing of artists like Sting, Joni Mitchell, and Quincy Jones, I always find that their lyrics are perfectly complimented by the music.
I think what keeps me going is know that there is nothing else in the world that makes me happier than music. Music is who I am, so even on the bad days when I don’t feel good enough or creative enough, music is al-ways the thing that keeps me going. But also our team. Our manager Al-exandra Lee and Jude keep me on my toes and never let me slack, their dedication inspires me a lot.
Were you trying to accomplish anything specific with this new sin-gle, “Weirdos and Freaks”? Creatively or otherwise?
J- “Weirdos and Freaks” is definitely a song with a message. For a period of time, a lot of fans were coming up to us and messaging us on social media about their bullies. We saw a post from a fan about how they were being bullied and it was hard to see. These weren’t just your stereotypical high school bullying stories either. Their stories were something that went far beyond anything that I had ever known in my life. We began to realize it was a bigger issue for our fans then we thought. We want to tell them that their weirdness is what makes cool. They should be proud to be dif-ferent and realize that their bullies aren’t even worth their time of day.
H – This single means a lot to me, because when I was in middle school I was bullied. When I sing this song, I wish that my younger self could’ve heard the words. When you’re called a name it’s something that really scars you when you’re going through it. I want anyone who has experi-enced something similar in their life to not let names scar them and to know that no one is worth your time or your tears when they don’t except you for who you are.
What was the last song you listened to?
J – “Just My Imagination” by the Temptations (and I listened to it on repeat for like an hour)
H – “I Want To Be Your Lover” by Prince (I broke out into full on singing and dancing in a coffee shop)
Which do you prefer? Vinyl? CDs? MP3s?
J – I didn’t grow up with vinyl and have never been cool enough to have a record player, so I guess I’m going to have to go with CDs, although most of the music I own is digital because of convenience. Also, my SIRI has terrible taste when I put her on shuffle, so it’s a love-hate relationship.
H – I love CDs. I used to carry around a portable CD player with me when I was little. I really love listening to albums in their entirety. But after my portable CD player I had the first iPod mini. I love that music has become more convenient but I stand by listening to CDs.
How about this one…. Do you prefer Spotify? Apple Music? Bandcamp? Or something else? Why?
J – All the music I own is bought… I don’t actually stream that much. ALT-hough I do occasionally use Pandora or Jango radio. Are those super ar-chaic now?
H – Like Jude, I like to buy music and support fellow musicians. I do have Apple Music to stream every once and a while.
Other than the digital era overwhelming us with access to an abun-dance of music, what are one or two of the biggest challenges you face when trying to attract listeners to your music?
J – Most of our fans are on Instagram and they’ll watch the 1 minute video we post, but I think it’s hard to actually get them to go to our bio and click the link to access the full video or full song. I encounter a lot of fans who know everything about us… what we did over the week, what we wore, who won the games we played (always me) but it’s weird when they don’t really know our music as well as they know us. It seems like they are tak-en in by the lifestyle and overall vibe of Honey and Jude. At the end of the day, they like music too, it’s just not in front of them as much as every-thing else is.
H – First, that we are pop artists. And pop is such a huge genre that it’s hard to stand out against the artists/music that’s on the radio.
Second, going off of what Jude said, being that this digital era is so over-whelming and everything is just a click away…it’s hard to get people to give us views/likes/plays on things associated with our music, when it’s not right in front of them.
Do you gig, tour or perform? Do you ever live stream? Where can music lovers see you live?
H&J – We do gig! We perform mostly in the LA, San Gabriel Valley and Orange County areas. A quick YouTube search will bring up a live streamed show from the Studio Venue, a cool spot in the Valley. We also use Periscope from time to time at our shows so people can join from all over! Music lovers can find out about our show schedule on our website at www.honeyandjudemusic.com
Where is the best place to connect with you online? Discover more of your music?
H&J – Our website is a great place to listen to our music and watch our videos all from the same place. We have lots of quirky stuff up on YouTube, and we post religiously to Instagram, so if you follow us there, you’ll always know what we are up to.
- Website: http://www.honeyandjudemusic.com
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/honeyandjude
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/honeyandjude
- IG: https://www.instagram.com/honeyandjude/
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/honeyandjude
Any last thoughts? Shout outs? Words of wisdom?
J – I’d like to give a shout out to all our “Beautiful Freaks.” Thanks for be-ing you!
And, separately, my words of wisdom are this: “It doesn’t matter what life throws at you. As long as your hair looks good, you got this.”
H – Shout out to our fans and anyone reading this! Thanks for getting to know us 😉
Words of wisdom… “Just keep swimming” ~ Dory
