Burden Yourself - Rocco DeLuca & the Burden

I Trust You To Kill Me. There is no escaping death, she will find you. Drown yourself in brand name booze or stay sensibly sober. Sample the pleasures of simple sex, or celebrate your celibacy. Live by "early to bed, early to rise" or go to parties that refuses to die simply because the sun comes up. This is the message that Rocco DeLuca and the Burden create with calculated effort and deliver with immeasurable depths through their music.

Rocco DeLuca, the son of a musician who traveled with Bo Diddley, remembers growing up as one long set. The music would go long as the night and eventually Rocco would crawl into his uncles bass drum and fall asleep to its unique lullaby. Since his dad was on the road a lot, and his mother wasn't in the picture, Rocco lived life on the road gaining the life experience necessary to influence his art. Spelling out the pain of life in verses, Rocco made his way from playing parties to signing on as the opening act for Taj Mahal. In 2004, Rocco roughed out a demo tape that made its way into the hands of Jude Cole. Cole, a major player at Indie record label, Ironworks Music, was looking to sign its first artist while getting a new sound out into the mainstream. Using the Dobro steel guitar, Rocco deftly fuses punk and blues. Combining that with vocals like an angel that's had to many cigarettes and the songs make you want to rip your heart out and stand idly by, watching as it gets stomped on with a pair of the singers scuffed up sneakers. Having opened for John Lee Hooker and played alongside Johnny Cash, guitar and lyrics alone would have been enough, but he didn't want to just get by. Friends who were more like family, and luckily talented ... joined Rocco. By adding band members, they were also building a better live show. More presence, more pain, more screeching. Consisting of four band members: drummer Ryan Carman, bass player Dave Beste percussionist Greg Velasquez and of course, the bands name sake and lead vocals, Rocco DeLuca the Burden was born.