One great thing about being a musician is being able to play whatever the hell you want and not stick to just one genre.

Deke Dickerson loves this perk in his job, and he mixes music styles such as rockabilly, country-jazz, surf, jump blues, swing and hillbilly boogie.

Dickerson relies on something a hippie chick once told him to explain his musical diversity.

“She asked me what my sign was,” Dickerson said from a Michigan hotel room. “I told her I was a Gemini, and she said `Oh, that’s why you play all these types of music. You wouldn’t be happy just playing one kind of music.'”

The Columbia, Mo.-born singer/songwriter/guitarist said he was actually turned onto different varieties of music when began going to shows at the Blue Note in Columbia. He said the club booked a wide range of incredible of acts.

“I saw everybody from John Lee Hooker to the Ramones,” Dickerson said. “So I think being exposed to a wide variety of music made me interested in a wide variety of music.”

Even after playing a hodgepodge of music for so long, Dickerson is still amazed at the diversity of people who enjoy his music – he never knows what to expect when he plays a show.

“We’ll do a gig in front of a bunch of real tough punk-rockers and bikers, they’ll dig it,” Dickerson said. “The next night we’ll play some gig where it’s mostly like a bunch of older people, and they’ll totally dig it. And the next night we’ll play in front of a bunch of alternative rockers and college kids, and they’ll like it. It’s really weird.”

One thing Dickerson worries about is that his music won’t translate well to his audiences since he mixes so many genres.

“Obviously you run the risk of playing so many different types of music that you’ll never make everybody happy,” Dickerson admitted. “So I just have to make myself happy, I guess.”

He began playing in bands over a decade ago when he was a founding member of Untamed Youth, a surf/garage band that mostly toured the Midwest.

In the early ’90s, he moved to Los Angeles and teamed up with Dave Stuckey to form the Dave and Deke Combo, a critically acclaimed act that became a pace-setter in the West Coast roots-music movement.

Dickerson’s first solo record came in 1998 when he teamed up with backing band the Ecco-Fonics and released “Number One Hit Record,” followed by “More Million Sellers” a year later.

“The guys that I play with are excellent musicians, and I would be hard pressed to find better ones, you know,” Dickerson said. “It’s one of the things that keeps me going and doing this . I have a really good band that’s fun to play with.”

“There was a couple times last year where we had some shuffling going on and we had a couple temporary guys,” he added. “It was miserable man, I hated it, if I had to do that all the time, I just wouldn’t do it.”

Next Tuesday marks the release of his third solo album with the Ecco-Fonics, “Rhythm, Rhyme and Truth.”

“I’ve been pimpin’ it off the stage, and everybody is real excited about the new songs that we’re playing,” Dickerson said about his new album.

Dickerson cited some differences between this record and his first two solo albums, but said the albums are musically similar for the most part.

“The biggest difference is that it’s a little more serious in tone. I don’t have 10 million guest artists like I did on the last couple ones,” Dickerson said. “I just tended to focus on a couple more serious subject matters, I guess.”

Dickerson said touring for this record has been going really well, with almost every show well-attended. Only one thing has set Dickerson and his group back.

“Our new van blew up in Amarillo, Tx.; that’s been the worst thing that’s happened so far,” Dickerson said. “We’re having to do the rest of the tour in a rental van.”

Besides touring and recording, Dickerson has found himself involved with other side projects. He was asked to record a Les Paul-sounding tune for the soundtrack to the movie “Election” a few years ago.

Dickerson also spent three months touring with Social Distortion frontman Mike Ness, when Ness put out his own solo album.

“The Mike Ness thing came around `cause he goes to local rockabilly shows in L.A., and I’ve actually known him since the Dave and Deke days,” Dickerson said. “He was doing this album that was more of a rockabilly, country thing, even though it was still pretty much punk rock; he was looking for a band to tour with – one of those things that kind of fell together. It was a whole lot of fun, man.”

Midwest musicians have always been debating whether or not moving to one of the coasts is necessary for making it big in music. Dickerson found himself moving to Los Angeles when his bands in the Midwest weren’t going anywhere.

“I don’t think you necessarily have to move to the West Coast or the East Coast, but you have to expose yourselves to those people. I heard someone say this expression. I think it was Rosie O’Donnell, but don’t quote me on that,” Dickerson said laughing. “They asked her why she moved to L.A., and she said, `Well, if you want to surf, you have to move to where the waves are.'”

Even with all the varieties of music Dickerson plays, he still focuses on keeping his live show interesting and exciting for the fans.

“We have a trailer full of baby chickens. We get some spiky boots, and we stomp on them – a really shock type of thing,” Dickerson said with complete seriousness. “But it gets people going. And we tell some dirty jokes, that sort of thing.”