We’re still stuck in the Seventies on this feature, which is appropriate as my copy of Rick Perlstein’s The Invisible Bridge arrived yesterday. On time and the UPS man actually knocked me up. I mean that, of course, in the British meaning of the phrase…
Dan Hicks and his Hot Licks were an oddity when they burst on the San Francisco music scene. An acoustic band more influenced by Django Reinhart, Johnny Mercer, and Bob Willis than the Beatles. That’s why it clicked so well. The different rocks even when there’s a fiddler involved.
1972’s Striking It Rich was Hicks’ breakthrough album, ably aided and abetted by its striking and cool matchbook cover. The whole package was swell but I’m still learning how to do graphics at the new joint so I’ma keep it simple:
Here are two of the band’s signature tunes from this LP:
