Rick DePaoli was born in Palermo, Sicily in 1965 and moved with his family to Jersey City, New Jersey at the age of three. He grew up in a restaurant environment as his family opened one of the first pizzerias in Bayonne—where his passion for cooking was ignited.
Long before food trucks became a trend, DePaoli’s family has owned an iconic food truck since 1980. Working alongside his mother, he learned not only how to prepare comforting, traditional Sicilian dishes, but also how to serve people with warmth and pride. But his aspirations extended beyond the kitchen. He wanted to connect with customers and describe his food with genuine love and authenticity.
Determined to refine his craft, DePaoli attended culinary school in Manhattan, where he received classical training before working in high-end New York City restaurants. There, he sharpened his skills both in the kitchen and front of house, learning from respected chefs while developing his own voice. Eventually, he launched his own food truck, the ideal combination of his culinary expertise and his passion for interacting with customers. Through it, he brought authentic, high-quality Sicilian comfort food to the community—just as his mother had taught him.
Though cooking became his profession, music was always DePaoli’s deepest passion. In his youth, he played guitar in a rock band alongside a former bandmate who later went on to perform with Guns N’ Roses. Family responsibilities ultimately led him to focus on food, but music never left him.
In 2017, he was working seven nights a week from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. in his food truck near the Daily News newspaper plant in Jersey City. While serving food to press workers on the night shift, DePaoli kept a guitar in his truck and wrote songs in between customers. He made a demo of the song he wrote the night before in his home studio during the daytime, often without sleep. When he had enough material, he moved on to recording them. A singer and guitarist, he recorded the album with renowned studio musicians: Michael Landau on guitar, Jimmy Johnson on bass, Andy Burton on piano, and Aaron Sterling on drums and percussion. The recordings were mixed by Grammy Award–winning engineer Kevin Killen, known for his work with U2, Peter Gabriel, and David Bowie. After completing the album, he pitched it to record labels but received no responses, leading him to shelve the project and focus entirely on his culinary career.
His collection of 13 songs was rediscovered in late 2025 by elsewhere music, a US label located in the neighborhood of his restaurant in Jersey City. The songs were newly mastered and will be released as the digital album 'Don’t Lose Your Faith' (elsesong 001) in April 2026.
'Don’t Lose Your Faith' reveals a body of work marked by rustic sincerity and heartfelt, straightforward singing—qualities that are rare in today's music landscape. Honest, melodic, and deeply human, the songs evoke the spirit of '60s and '70s pop rock while speaking directly to the heart. They reflect the soul of an artist torn between passion and responsibility yet never losing faith in his music.
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