Hedwig
Written by Abby Scicchitano / December 2009
The band’s guitarist is the only member to have changed in the last two years. Hedwig’s original guitar player was Jon “Jonny Face” Wilk. Jon left the band in April of 2009 and the members consider themselves fortunate to have found such a great musician in Jake, who joined the band in May of 2009.
In 1997, Geoff, Jim and Jon fiddled around with their first band Grinding Organs, playing parties in Geoff’s Basement with no drummer. The whole experience was intended for fun and was never expected to leave the basement. Later, when Jon left the band for the first time, a new guitarist was found, Dave was playing drums, and the band became Skrutape.
As Skrutape, the guys played some local shows and made friends with other area bands like 81 South and Darkest Grey, forming an alliance, performing underground-style shows together all around the Coal Region.
Eventually, things went sour with Skrutapes guitarist in 2002 and all that was left of the band was Geoff and Dave. Jim and Jon would make occasional appearances for fun-sake but nothing was ever expected to go anywhere.
From 2006 to 2007, Dave and Geoff did some intense training. Geoff honing his bass skills and Dave really getting his beats down on the drums. They were starting to get serious, learning songs and finally decided to reform and start something new. Jon quickly became the guitar player. Jim wasn’t available, so Aaron Shutt of Darkest Grey took over lead vocals for a while, until finally Jim came back and took over the role a few months later.
The guys had also decided on a name and considering all of the time Dave “Hed” and Geoff “Wig” spent getting their sound together – the band decided to put them together and name themselves Hedwig, as the name remains today.
Around September of 2007, Jon Donovan of Copper Seven offered Hedwig a few opening spots. This would be the first time that Hedwig would perform and things went well. After a few opening acts, Hedwig started booking shows and offering openings to other up and coming bands.
Now, as the headlining act, they needed a sound crew that they could depend on. After searching for a while and checking out different production company’s, they found who they truly consider to a part of the band, Crazy Columbians Sound Crew (a division of H&H Sound Productions). The band and the production crew have spent some time really getting the sound down and have been rocking shows together all this time.
While Hedwig does spend time in the songwriting process, they do consider themselves mainly to be a straight up Rock ‘n Roll cover band, taking popular rock songs and twisting them slightly to make them their own. They’ve been playing bars and the occasional charity event for nearly two years now. Though Jon has gone a separate way, Jake is there to take up the slack and help to really define the Hedwig sound.
The bands fan base is ever growing. Their song lists is becoming more and more diverse. Opportunities to play bigger and better clubs keep coming. “The band is ever growing, ever getting bigger & better, and always looking for new places to get the crowd motivated. As a band, we couldn’t be happier with our place as one of the biggest Rock bands in the area,” says lead singer Jim “Uncle Bill” DePeal.
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