Culture
Jake Dunn joins cerebral meat-and-potato rock outfit Cutler Station
By: Emily Votaw
Posted on:
Most of the time, it’s not going to get much better than boarding a plane headed to Hawaii.
Then again — most of the time, Cutler Station isn’t going to ask you to join their band on the same day you’re slated to leave the dreary Midwest on your way to the Aloha State.
Such was the happy quirk of fate for Jake Dunn, known best perhaps for being the Jake Dunn of Pomeroy’s Jake Dunn & the Blackbirds – who now finds himself the latest addition to Southeast Ohio’s finest cerebral meat-and-potato rockers.
“I was actually waiting to get on the plane to Hawaii with my wife — so we were already really excited to be going on this trip. And then John (Evans, of Cutler Station) messages me and says, ‘Hey, we’ve been chatting and we wanted to see if you’d come on board,'” said Dunn. “I was immediately overwhelmed with joy because it was like a dream come true! And I don’t even mean that in an over exaggerated way, either. It’s been so much fun.”
Cutler Station will debut the band’s new lineup on Thursday, February 24 at The Union, (18 West Union Street, Athens) where the band will be joined by the great John Borchard and special guests Chris Michael and the Andrews.
Cutler Station is a tightly knit group. Founding members Steve Lipscomb, Jason Swiger, and brothers John and Kirby Evans have been playing together for decades. While that kind of dynamic can be intimidating to join, Dunn isn’t the first musician to be excited at the opportunity of joining the group. John Borchard played on Cutler Station’s 2020 album “Meat, No Sides,” and even given Borchard’s rich musical background, he found collaborating with Cutler Station to be exciting and refreshing.
“The thing that I like about these guys is that their writing is so unique. I mean, it really is something else,” said Borchard.
Cutler Station has enjoyed integrating Jake Dunn into their sound so far.
“With our newer songs, we thought we had an idea of where we were landing with a lot of them, and then Jake comes in and he adds some guitar or piano — and it just takes it in a totally new but exciting way for us,” said Lipscomb.
Dunn has also been enjoying the experience.
“It’s been a lot of fun learning these new songs — and it’s really different for me coming into it because I’m so used to being at the front of the band and writing the songs in a completely different way,” Dunn said. “So it’s been really fun for me to write within the context of this new unit, where everybody’s bringing something unique to the table.”
In addition to the February 24 show at The Union, Cutler Station has upcoming performances at The Loud (741 6th Avenue, Huntington, WV) on February 26; the Worthington Golf Club (3414 Roseland Avenue, Parkersburg, WV) on March 18; and the Adelphia Music Hall (205 2nd Street, Marietta, OH) on March 26.