New Shaking Through with Hezekiah Jones

WXPN and Weathervane Music’s newest Shaking Through artist is Philly’s Hezekiah Jones. On March 11th and 12th, Raphael Cutrufello—lead singer and songwriter in the band—assembled a group of 10 local Philly musicians and singers and recorded a new song, “Borrowed Heart.” It’s a song that Cutrufello wrote as part of a work-in-progress “soundtrack” to one of his favorite monster movies, The Bride Of Frankenstein. I had the pleasure of watching much of the recording of the song at Miner Street Studios in Fishtown. I was at the studio because I curated the session. Each artist that is featured in an episode of Shaking Through is selected by a curator; past curators have included Scott McMicken of Dr. Dog, music blogger Mark Schoneveld of YVYNYL, and Peter Silberman of The Antlers. My role as curator was to make the suggestion to the folks at Weathervane for an artist to feature. Hezekiah Jones was one of the first artists I thought of.

As I say in the video below, I think Cutrufello is one of the most original and unique musicians in the local scene. When he, bassist Phil D’Agostino, and I initially met to talk about the project, Cutrufello suggested doing a song from his Bride Of Frankenstein project. I immediately knew this was going to be something pretty special. Other players were added to the mix as we moved forward. Andrew Lipke, himself a talented songwriter, guitarist and producer was added to the mix. (Lipke and Cutrufello worked together on Hezekiah Jones’s new album Have You Seen Our New Fort.) Filling out the recording are musicians Tom Bendel on drums, D’Agostino on bass/vibraphone/brake drum, Brad Hinton on acoustic/lap steel/banjo/vocals, Kiley Ryan on violin/vocals, Alison Wadsworth on vocals, and Sisters 3 (Annachristie, Beatrice, and Cassandra Sadler) on vocals. Check out the video and download the song below and for more information, pictures and videos from the session go here to Shaking Through.