JASON RICCI & NEW BLOOD Source: Tampa Tribune Date: 07/2009 Writer: Curtis Ross

Jason Ricci’s blues pedigree is impeccable. He studied the harmonica masters, especially Little Walter, for years. He paid dues in the Deep South playing with Junior Kimbrough and R.L. Burnside before the hipsters discovered them. He’s even been to jail.

Beyond that, Ricci may be the least likely blues great ever.

He’s gay, sober and politically outspoken. He listens to everything from classical to rap. And his hair and clothes are those of a punk rocker.

It was punk rock that led Ricci to the harmonica, and the harmonica led him to the blues.

“I was in a punk band and I wasn’t a very good singer,” Ricci says by telephone on his way to Key West for a Fourth of July weekend run.

“The guys were starting to write songs and take turns singing,” he continues. They gave me a harmonica as a way to not ruin the music. If I had guitar or drums I could cause serious damage.”

Figuring “there are not many great punk rock harmonica players,” Ricci found his way to the blues and quickly immersed himself in it.

“For a while I was one of those blues snobs – “If it’s not blues, it’s crap!”” he says with a laugh, referencing an old “Saturday Night Live” sketch. “I went for years listening only to (harmonica great) Little Walter.” 

He took to drugs with a vengeance too, winding up in a rehab “boot camp,” as he calls it, in lieu of prison after a robbery conviction.

He couldn’t listen to music while he was locked up. A condition of his probation forbade him from working in the music industry.

“I had to get a regular job for first time in years, which was good for me” Ricci says. “I learned to be happy with me, whether or not I was playing music.”

Achieving that, he tore back into music with a renewed passion.

He formed New Blood in 2002, logging plenty of road miles before releasing “Blood on the Road” in 2006. Signing to Delta Groove, the band released “Rocket Number Nine” in 2008.The title comes from a Sun Ra song the band covered on the album.

Another Ra song, “Enlightenment,” closes Ricci’s latest album, this year’s “Done With the Devil.” He also reworks tunes by Willie Dixon, Mongo Santamaria and Glenn Danzig alongside his own compositions.

It’s electric and exhilarating in a way the blues too often isn’t. No small part of that is due to the expert musicianship of Ricci and his band mates, guitarist Shawn Starski, bassist Todd Edmunds and drummer Ed Michaels.

“I’ll go without financially to keep my guys paid. That’s not a popular thing with some blues musicians,” Ricci says. “The nature of material we play requires we have highly rehearsed individuals who are familiar with the material, listening to everything that’s going on, and ready and willing to change it.”

Ricci and New Blood have been blowing minds at blues clubs and festivals across the country and in Europe, at least those with minds open enough to accept a gay man playing the blues.

“We’ve lost some gigs because of it, but the question is how many?” Ricci says. “The ones who say “We don’t book [gays],” that’s a little easier to deal with than the ones who are a little more insidious.”

Ricci has toned down some of his political broadsides of late.

“I got a little tired of people wanting to beat me up,” he says. “Now I’m focused on changing me first. Any problems need to be worked on internally before they’re worked on externally.”