Jerry David DeCicca is a songwriter, record-maker, and producer that lives in Bulverde, Texas with his wife, 2 dogs, 3 cats, and toads. He has produced records for legendary artists like Larry Jon Wilson, Bob Martin, Ed Askew, Chris Gantry, Will Beeley, and Ralph White, and curated many other musical projects. His former band, The Black Swans, released records and toured between 2004-2011. He owns and operates a vocational rehabilitation agency that serves the Texas Hill Country and surrounding areas.
I wrote and recorded Cardiac Country, my 6th solo album, just a few months before I received a diagnosis that led to open heart surgery at the Cleveland Clinic to replace my leaky aortic valve. At the time of its inception, I thought I was in the best shape of my life. Only the last song, “Old Hat,” was written and recorded with the knowledge of my health issue. I tracked "Old Hat," solo acoustic, two weeks before my operation, just in case… You can hear me running out of air as I sing and play.
I listen to these songs now and try to make sense of what my body was telling my pen and guitar, dissecting the information my brain didn’t yet know. BJ Cole, legendary steel guitar player, performs on 8 of 10 of these folk-country gemstones via his home in London. The rest was cut mostly live in San Antonio, TX at the great Blue Cat Studios.
If the heart is a metaphor and a muscle, both versions found themselves in my songs like never before. I’m not much of a woo-woo guy, so hearing my own music this way is something I want to reject, but also can’t deny.
"If you somehow think that you like the band Spiritualized but not the Bob Dylan album Nashville Skyline then Jerry David DeCicca is on the scene to prove you wrong." --Tyler Mahan Coe, Cocaine & Rhinestones podcast
“… a thing of gentle and radian wonder, a psycho-geographical diary of the Texas Hill Country that he now calls home. In many ways, Time The Teacher feels ageless, its defining characteristics being soft piano, muted horns and gospel harmonies, all moving along with the same unhurried serenity as DeCicca’s voice.” Uncut - Americana Album of The Month (MARCH, 2018)
"DeCicca has learned some significant lessons from his tenure on this Earth.” Stereogum
“...a remarkable feat of empathy, so tender and calm, and always a quietly good cheer.” The FADER"DeCicca is a careful, precise songwriter, but the songs don't necessarily sound written. Instead, they seem like they occurred to him naturally and ineluctably. " -- Pitchfork
"DeCicca's songs have always been steeped in the kinds of subjective truth that we find in history, movies, literature, and music. He uses allusion, metaphor, and history to weave his own hybrid mythology…” All Music
“...there is a delightful delicacy of touch in his compositions and vocal delivery that deserves attention.” The Line Of Best Fit“… engages with the big, timeless subjects we expect to find in poetry—love, place and the ghosts of place, loss, memory—but it’s also full of the delicious particulars of a particular life...” —Maggie Smith, author of Good Bones
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