Rocco Deluca: Biography

• Overview
• Discography
• Biography
• Related Artists

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• Rocco Deluca & the Burden

Born:

Jan 1, 1976 in California

Genres:

Rock Music, Alternative Rock Music, Singer/Songwriter Rock Music

Decades Active:

2000's

Coming across like a cross between Beck's casual mastery of various musical idioms (minus the surrealistic sarcasm) and the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion with a much stronger take on the music's history, Rocco Deluca plays a decidedly modern take on traditional blues rock. Born in southern California in 1976, Deluca claims to have largely grown up on the RB touring circuit, the son of a single father who was one of Bo Diddley's backing guitarists. Exposed to the blues both on the tour bus and in family living room jam sessions, Deluca picked up the guitar at a young age, and eventually settled on the Dobro (a resonating metal top guitar that was a key part of Delta blues in the age before amplification) as his primary instrument. After several years continuing the vagabond lifestyle of his childhood, Deluca settled back in Los Angeles and started a weekly residency at the Gypsy Lounge, a wellknown blues and country bar in Orange County. While opening for bluesmen like Taj Mahal, Deluca caught the attention of an AR representative for Ironworks Records, a new independent label started by '80s pop singer Jude Cole and actor Kiefer Sutherland, and in 2004 became the label's first signing. During sessions for Deluca's first album, produced by Cole, the pair put together a fulltime backing band for Deluca's vocals and Dobro, consisting of bassist Dave Beste, percussionist Gary Velasquez and drummer Ryan Carman. That debut album, I Trust You To Kill Me, was released in March 2006, coinciding with a DVD documentary by the same title that featured Sutherland shepherding Rocco Deluca and the Burden on their first international press tour.

- Stewart Mason, All Music Guide