Wrapper: African Sun Grown
Binder: Ecuadorian Habano
Filler: Nicaraguan Ligero, Dominican Ligero, PA Seco
Size: 6 x 58 “Perfecto”
Body: Full
Price: Only Available in the Leccia Black & White Variety Sampler 6 Cigars $55.75 MSRP ($45.00 at BCP)

From the Leccia Tobacco site:

“The Leccia Tobacco White is a 5 country blend handcrafted in Nicaragua. An African Sun Grown wrapper leaf surrounds this blend over an Ecuadorian Habano leaf. The filler uses the finest ligero from Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic. Centering this blend is seco leaf from Pennsylvania, Sam Leccia’s home state. It has hints of a creamy coffee and lightly sweet roasted cashews, while delivering strength and spice. It’s a medium strength cigar that delivers ample smoke and flavor that graces the palate with a variety of complex flavors.”

I nabbed one of these from BestCigarPrices.com:

“Sam Leccia of Cain and Nub fame is back with his own line of innovative premium cigars.
“Sam Leccia Black features a Habano wrapper, Nicaraguan Rosado binder, and a filler blend containing ligero from Esteli, Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic, as well as Brazilian Mata Fina and a half leaf of “Dark Fire”, a proprietary wood fire cured leaf lending a smoked whisky flavor and aroma and complex notes of spices and charred oak. Needless to say, this unique blend is a must try for those with an adventurous palate.
“Sam Leccia White features an African Sun Grown wrapper, binder from Ecuador, and fillers of Nicaraguan Ligero and Pennsylvania Seco for a full flavored smoke that is truly one of a kind.
“This slick 6-cigar sampler lets you sample both delicious blends in Leccia’s Black & White series.”

The sampler contains two each of three sizes of both the Black and White blends: 4 x 46 Petit Robusto, 6 x 50 Toro and two special sizes. There is a 6 x 58 Perfecto for the White blend. And a box-pressed 6 x 54 for the Black blend.

I have been a patient boy giving the stick some humidor time but one thing can be sure with any Leccia blend, it only takes a week or two and the stick is good to go. This being a big stick, I am sticking my neck out a bit with only two weeks humidor time.

Here we go.

The stick is beautifully constructed. The Perfecto shape is flawless. Seams are tight and there are few veins. The medium brown color of dark honey and tree sap is oily and a little toothy. The triple cap is flawless. It is raining and dreary outside and no sun for my photos. My apologies.

I V cut the cap in my giant four hole table cutter and then get aromas of cocoa, cinnamon, coffee, earth, nuts, orange citrus, prune danish, and spice. Already different from the regular sized White blend.
Time to light up.

The first puffs are sweet and spicy. The draw is on the money. The spiciness becomes red pepper in a flash and keeps on stretching its arms.

Cocoa and brown sugar arrives next. Creaminess appears in the first half inch.

The strength moves to a tick above medium bodied from the get go. The spiciness really takes off as my sinuses clear.

I plan to review the special sized Black box pressed 6 x 54 Torpedo next. The shape of a cigar can radically alter its flavor profile. The Perfecto is not for sale on its own as far as I could Google. So the sampler is the only way to get your hands on it. And since you are only paying $7.50 per stick, on average, it is a very good deal.

As it turns out, very few stores carry the sampler. Why? Because this sampler was designed primarily for Leccia Cigar Events. And if they do carry the sampler, they want more than BCP. The sampler was only released in April and I have no idea how many were distributed.

The cigar is becoming very tasty very quickly. The burn line is just fine. No touch ups required. Here are the flavors: Sweetness, honey, nuts, floral notes, cocoa, coffee, creaminess, brown sugar, coffee, honey dew melon, earthiness, and leather. Whew.

The flavors are similar to the Leccia White I reviewed in June of last year, but much more intense. It will make flavor bomb status any moment.

A meaty component enters. Not fire cured like the Black. But rather a grilled filet mignon. I can taste the charred notes of the steak.

After smoking 2”, it is flavor bomb status time.

I smoked one of the petit robustos last week and while it was very good, it did not have the qualities that the Perfecto has. The small cigar had intense flavors zinging past my palate. While the Perfecto saunters and strolls.

I would love to get a box of the Perfectos. I’ve smoked all four sizes: Little Guy: 4 x 46, Double Toro: 6 x 60, Toro: 6 x 50, and the Robusto: 5 x 52.

The second third begins and the flavors really jump into action. Broadening their spectrum.

The stick must not be as jam packed as I thought because it seems to be burning a little faster than I anticipated. And my only other criticism is that there are now soft spots. Sort of spongy.

It appears that they didn’t use the same quality control on the Perfecto as they did on the other sizes.

But it is a fine tasting blend. Regardless of construction issues. I would imagine that if bought separately, it would bring in a $10 price point.

I find myself at the halfway point and the flavor profile has shifted: Sweetness, earthiness, cocoa, creaminess, coffee, nuts, honey, meaty, and leather. The melon is gone. So is the brown sugar and floral notes.

It is a much earthier cigar now. The strength moves to a solid medium/full. And some nicotine is leaking in.
The char line has remained dead nuts.

I try to remove the cigar band and there is way too much glue on it. It forces me to use an X-Acto blade to remove it leaving a small nick in the wrapper. Hopefully, it doesn’t spread. I found this to be the case in all of the Leccia cigars. Someone dropped the ball in quality control on this one.

With one third left in the cigar, the strength moves to full bodied. Still only a bit of nicotine.

Here are the flavors for the last time: Creaminess, sweetness, coffee, honey, earthiness, cinnamon, wood, leather, and meaty.

The nick from removing the cap is wreaking havoc on the back side of the cigar. I glue what I can but it’s a mess.

On the upside, the flavors are wonderful.

I am conflicted about this Perfecto because of construction issues. Your cigar experience shouldn’t be a hassle. It feels like coming up with a Perfecto was a mere after thought. And not given the attention it needs.

I still think that the sampler is a great idea and a chance to smoke the different sizes and blends all in one box…for an affordable price point.

I’m much more partial to the Black blend and look forward to reviewing the box pressed 6 x 54.
Check out BestCigarPrices.com for the sampler. It is a good deal.

And now for something completely different:

Back to good ol’ rock n roll.

We were high on hash or weed all the time. On the road. Off the road. In rehearsals. In the recording studio. And that last one killed us.

By the time we had moved past promoting the Live album, we were at Island Studios in the Jamaican district of London. Cheap bastard, Miles Copeland, got us an untested producer that had been a crack engineer on some of the best, and most famous, albums of the time. But he had no idea of how to control a band.

Except for me, the band was all egomaniacs. I played the proverbial negotiator as two distinct camps formed. The first was Darryl the leader and violinist. Along with Mick Jacques the guitarist.

The other camp was Sonja Kristina, the singer, and Stewart Copeland, the drummer.

All new songs were written by Darryl and Sonja with the assistance of Sonja’s lover, Norma Tager. Tager was an American novelist and poet and struck up a friendship with Sonja. Those three went at each other like cats and dogs. We only heard about it as the other three of us were not allowed in the composing portion of the album.

But I still wrote my own song I wanted on the album called, “I Broke My Leg in Yucca Valley But My Heart Lies in Palm Springs.” And those were the entire lyrics to the song which was mostly an instrumental featuring me on bass. It was very high energy along the lines of Mahavishnu Orchestra.

Darryl could not grasp it and bailed out on us as we worked things out in the studio. That left Mick on guitar and it was over his head too. That left me and Stewart and Sonja. Very weird.

Jose Feliciano had made his first trip to London while we were recording and had brought the now world famous percussionist, Paulhino de Costa with him. During a playback of the song, he jumped up, grabbed Paulhino and dashed into the recording area. They both saved my song and it was the hottest tune on the album. Further causing me to slip away from being in the band for very much longer.

Curved Air was a progressive band. The musicians were all classically trained in the best universities of England. They all came from families with money. And they were arrogant to a fault.

Darryl probably had some sort of mental disorder like ADHD. He was moody and had fits of anger that shook the room. And then he would be the nicest guy on the planet.

Sonja was just plain strange. Very insecure. She needed constant attention and reinforcement of her abilities. And she had a mean streak. Too many years as a junkie, I presume. Although, she had finally cleaned herself up by the end of the Live album tour.

Drugs took their toll on her body. She was a beautiful woman but as Yohannian put it, “…the body of Lance Armstrong.”
We did the normal thing bands did during that time period. First, we lay down the rhythm tracks which took two weeks. After that came the layering of other instruments and vocals.

I had this feeling in my gut that the songs were lame. I couldn’t tell anyone because I was still the new guy and was in neither camp. The drummer, guitarist, the singer and I were smoking dope during the whole recording process. It forced us to do a lot of corrections during the mixing process. This pissed off management.

Curved Air decided to venture into a different direction with the Midnight Wire album. It was too Americanized and done poorly. It was my playing that had such a big influence on the direction yet I was not asked to help in the compositions.

As a result, I felt my bass lines..given to me instead of allowing me to work out my own, were very lame and understated…too understated.

RCA had a big party for the play back of the album. All suits and fancy dresses were at the playback. It was the first time I had heard the record played in its entirety.

I was shocked as I heard whispers when my song came on. No one got it. I brought real progression to the album and the suits didn’t like it. Too progressive and too jazzy.

It was at this point, that upper management made the decision to scrap the album and start again. A patsy was needed and who better than me to get chucked from the band?

I had nothing to do with the compositions. I had nothing to do with the mixing or producing. I was treated like a side man the entire time. Yet it was my fault that the album sucked.

They re-recorded the album with real record producers. Big shot brother team from Miami.

Dumping me before the new recording was the meanest thing ever done to me. I was cast aside like a lump of dog shit.

When the re-done album came out, there were virtually no changes and they had even kept some of my bass playing..without giving me credit of course. Or royalties.

This was just an eye opener on how nasty the music business is. I still carry a grudge for what they did to me. They left me stranded in England with no money. The band, and management, refused to give me any dough to stay alive. Just tossed me aside.

So the roadies brought over every piece of gear they could get their hands on and shoved it into a big lorry and delivered it to my house in Edgeware.

It allowed me to sell the equipment and have money to live on. Management didn’t do a thing when they found out about this. Guilt, I suppose.

I hung around England for a few months trying to find something..a new band. But my money ran out and I had to make a hard decision. Be dirt poor and keep trying, or go home. I chose to leave London and return to the States.

There is no loyalty in that nasty business. But I kept on chooglin back in Long Beach, California with a recording studio, session player, and managing groups. I spent a total of 10 years in the biz and then just gave up.

Those years give me plenty of talking points at parties and even though I got the shaft after two years with the band, it was a helluva experience.

Categories: CIGAR REVIEWS

Tags: cigar review, cigar reviews by the katman, cigars, leccia tobacco, Leccia White Perfecto Cigar Review