Appearances, as they say, can be deceiving. A first look at Jason Ricci – with his blond braids, sometimes multicolored hair and do-rag – might give the impression that he’s a Grateful Dead refugee or maybe a member of some white-boy reggae band.
But no, Ricci is, in fact, one of the country’s preeminent blues harmonica players. Though he might seem to be something of a square peg in a round hole, Ricci is a well-respected musician in the blues community. In addition to putting out his own CD’s, he has played on albums by Johnny Winter, Walter Trout, Ana Popovic, Cedric Burnside and Joe Louis Walker. Ricci was named Best Harmonica Player at the 2010 Blues Music Awards, and in 2015, he performed at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony, paying tribute to Paul Butterfield with a sizzling performance alongside guitarists Zac Brown and Tom Morello (Rage Against the Machine).
Shifting to the present, Ricci has a new album out – Behind the Veil – and he’s excited about it. Was there a plan, a theme, a central inspiration when he headed into the studio?
“Definitely,” says Ricci, speaking from his home in the Crescent City. “There’s this radio show here in New Orleans on WWOZ, on Wednesday night, an old ‘50s R&B and blues show, and I had been listening to that a lot.
“And I was interested, not only in how the music sounded, but how did they get it to sound that way? So I said, ‘Let’s do it that way. Let’s just go back and put everything in one room, and even put up mics to catch bleed-through. And it was hard to find an engineer, in this day and age, to do that.
“I went through three on the phone, and they all said, ‘Yeah, that sounds great, but we’re not going to do the drums that way.’ And I said, ‘Sorry, I can’t use you.’ Finally, we ran into Tony [Daigle], and Tony got it right off the bat. I wanted it to sound more like those old records, and I was willing to live with whatever performance imperfections that we couldn’t fix, so that the overall sonic sound would be like that.”
The aim of recording is often to capture those “magic moments,” and this approach is certainly evident on Behind the Veil. “Every record that I’ve ever done, the whole aim of the record was to try to get it to sound as good as the live show. And even when we made the solos perfect and overdubbed them and everything, there was always something missing. And that missing thing was for us to be able to look at each other in the studio. I guess it sounds kind of abstract, but it’s a real thing.”
In addition to maintaining a full performance schedule, Ricci supplies a steady stream of online video content each week. “Sixteen years total, coming up on 17, I’ve been making free YouTube lessons. There’s over 600 harmonica-related instructional content kind of things.”
Does Ricci subscribe to the notion that a person learns a lot while teaching? “I can’t even tell you how true that is,” Ricci says. “It’s been mind-blowing. Jack DeJohnette, the great jazz drummer, said, ‘The music business ruined my chops.’ And if it wasn’t for the teaching, I don’t think that I would have a harmonica in my mouth and music on my mind for a significant portion of every single day. So I’m thinking and I’m talking and I’m playing for a significant potion of every single day.”
Behind the Veil is steeped in the blues, but other musical influences are certainly evident. It might be said that Ricci and his band, The Bad Kind, are pushing blues into the future.
“I don’t know about all that,” Ricci says with a laugh. “I used to think that way when I was younger. When I was interested in crossing over and being a big rock star. And now I’m like, ‘Hey, let’s just make the best music we can.’ Let’s hope it sells, but the music industry and marketing and Spotify – it’s all so dismal now. In a way, it’s easier to make sincere music, because it’s so hopeless. So it’s like, ‘Let’s just make the best shit that we can, because no one’s going to buy it.’ They’ll hear it, but they won’t buy it. So who cares, right?
“I want blues, I want New Orleans R and B, and I want jazz. And I want less of the rock edge. Funk is fine, but less of the rock and roll.”
“Growing up, I was a rocker and I was a jazzer. I was trying to push everything to the edge – ‘Let’s play a song in 7/8! Let’s cover The Misfits, Lou Reed and Sun Ra all in the same set!’ And now I’m older, and there’s so many rockers in the blues now that I’m rebelling in the direction that my teachers taught me: play the old stuff!
“I think we can still write – lyrically – modern, but keep the music less rocked-up. I want blues, I want New Orleans R and B, and I want jazz. And I want less of the rock edge. Funk is fine, but less of the rock and roll.”
One of the album’s standout cuts is “St. James’ Infirmary.” Kind of an obvious choice for a New Orleans musician, no?
“I say it’s too obvious a decision,” Ricci chuckles. “It’s almost the ‘Mustang Sally’ of New Orleans music. It came out impromptu one evening with [keyboard player] Joe Krown. It was in a key that I knew I could sing it in, so I did it, and it came out pretty good.
“So I brought it to a rehearsal, and [guitarist] Brent Johnson added a little gypsy flair to it and gave it more of a French flavor. I sing the song thinking of my friends who have overdosed. Emotionally, when I engage in that song, I’m imagining myself or someone else being brought into the morgue. So when I’m singing, that’s where I’m coming from.”
Kaitlin Dibble, Ricci’s wife and a member of his band, is featured on a number of the album’s songs, including an impassioned cover of Ruth Brown’s “5-10-15 Hours.” Dibble and Ricci share vocals on “Why Don’t We Sleep on It,” a song that reflects the tensions that sometimes occur between spouses. The song gets extra points for rhyming “a million in the bank” with “selling bathtub crank.”
“We were in a big fight, and I was writing the song at her,” Ricci recalls. “No matter how great the relationship is, the other person is going to cramp your style in some way or another. And I’m a workaholic. I love working, to the point where it’s unhealthy, actually. I become dysfunctional and irritable. So when I was writing the number, I was thinking, ‘It’s be so much better if your weren’t around. This is what I’d do, and I’d be a superstar, I’d have more money,’ and all this stuff.
“And as I was writing the song, I was imagining what she would say. So I started to write her lines in, and they were making sense, actually. And it was great, because it made me less mad – a lot less mad – at her. And I sang it to Kait, and she loved it. We love doing the number – it’s a lot of fun.”
Since Ricci has played the Big Easy and the Green Oaks Tavern in the past, any chance that we will see him in Houston sometime soon? “I love Houston,” Ricci says. “It’s a sister city to New Orleans. You’ve had our backs, and I was grateful that we could have yours the last time you guys got flooded. We love you guys very much. I’m a big Mighty Orq fan too – We love him!”
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2023.
