Jerry David DeCicca – “Manzanita Bay”
One of our very favorite Texas-based troubadours has announced the release of his fifth solo album, New Shadows, out on September 21st. True porch music (Jerry literally wrote the album on his front porch,) he describes the album as “literary-goth and avant-Americana meditation, absurd and ruminative,” which sounds like true Jerry music and is exemplified extraordinarily in Manzanita Bay – a little broody, a little dance-y, and absolutely nails the goal of the album’s production modeling Jerry’s favorite early 80s albums (ZZ Top, Lindsey Buckingham, Lou Reed, Robert Palmer). “Manzanita Bay” features David Hidalgo from Los Lobos on electric guitar, Rosali singing alongside Jerry (what a fabulous a pairing!), and a “really loud tambourine.”
Just in time for the date repeated in the song, we’re proud to share the single from this storied songwriter and true head (and heart). Pre-order New Shadows on Bandcamp!
Black out the windows
Bring down the day
Across the street in the playground
I can hear the children play
Like nothing is wrong
Like nothing has changed
On the 5th day of August
On Manzanita Bay
Drove up from Tacoma
Beat the blues like a drum
And two hours later
Washed it down with spiced rum
And if it was raining
I really can’t say
On the 5th day of August
On Manzanita Bay
Talked about us on the radio
Talked about us in the bars
And out on the beaches
Where the tourists counted stars
Back when moonlight mattered
And we were too young to obey
On the 5th day of August
On Manzanita Bay
On the 5th day of August
On Manzanita Bay
On the 5th day of August
New Shadows peeks into corners where interior and exterior worlds collide, where miniscule revelations can be found in the darkness of ourselves and our community: lost children, unheard prayers, bugs, money, depression, romantic relationships, regret, and Zoom funerals, all become a lens for self-reflection.
The production (by Don Cento and JDD) is modeled after DeCicca’s favorite early 80’s albums (Lindsey Buckingham’s Law & Order, ZZ Top’s Afterburner, Robert Palmer’s Clues, Lou Reed’s New Sensations,) while the songs’ architectures and pathos lean more towards Warren Zevon, Townes Van Zandt, and John Prine – all these record-makers and songwriters are embedded in DeCicca’s DNA, having seen them, and in some cases met them after gigs, when his brain was still developing between the ages of 13-19 years old.
The virtual collaborators are the musicians whose kept him company while isolated in his rural town, Bulverde, TX: Brian Harnetty’s Many Hands, Rosali’s No Medium, Irreversible Entanglements’ Who Sent You?, James Brandon Lewis’s Jessup Wagon, Jeff Parker’s JP’s Myspace Beats and Suite for Max Brown, and the Los Lobos discography.
New Shadows isn’t so much about DeCicca’s new discoveries, as it is the penumbrous reminder of what’s always been there.
