How to go
Who: WYSO-FM (91.3) presents Dan Hicks and the Hot Licks
Where: Carillon Park, 1000 Carillon Blvd., Dayton
When: 5:30 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 16
Cost: Free
More info: (937) 767-6420 or www.wyso.org
Artist info: www.danhicks.net
Most of his contemporaries in psychedelic San Francisco were exploring far out sounds when Dan Hicks formed the Hot Licks in 1968. Despite the anachronistic nature of the music — an acoustic fusion of western swing, jazz and folk — the group’s sound was fresh, fun and hard to resist.
Now, 41 years later, Hicks has returned with “Tangled Tales,” another instantly engaging collection of songs. The last few Hot Licks albums on Surfdog Records, “Beatin’ the Heat” and “Selected Shorts,” featured a wide array of guest vocalists such as Van Dyke Parks, Elvis Costello, Willie Nelson and Bette Midler. This CD has guests, David Grisman, Charlie Musslewhite and Roy Rogers, but their contributions are all of the musical nature.
“It just so happened that everybody turned out to be instrumentalist,” Hicks said in a recent telephone interview. “I approached a couple of different vocalists and they didn’t have time or couldn’t fit it in their schedule or they never called back or something so it just turned out instrumentally this time. And that’s OK with me.”
“Tangled Tales,” released by Surfdog on March 24, is a return to the sound Hicks perfected over three classic albums in the early 1970s.
“The whole idea was to make it sound more like I sound with less production,” Hicks said. “The other ones on Surfdog are a little more produced than I would’ve decided myself, but I wasn’t entirely in control. This time they kind of left me and this producer alone. Rather than taking the stuff and adding to it and thinking you’re making it all that much greater, we took a simpler approach. That’s how it turned out to be more straight ahead, which is what I like.”
WYSO presents Dan Hicks and the Hot Licks at Carillon Park on Sunday, Aug. 16. The current lineup features Hicks (vocals, guitar), Roberta Donnay (vocals, percussion) and Daria (vocals, percussion), Paul Smith (bass), Richard Chon (violin, mandolin) and Paul Robinson (guitar).
“I like the sound we’re making and I like having the others up there,” Hicks said. “I find I’m still creative enough with the stage patter and stuff to keep me entertained too. If I was just doing a humdrum, rote thing, I wouldn’t enjoy it, but it’s not that way. It’s sort of a style of jazz really so there’s improv and all kinds of stuff happening. It’s still interesting and I still feel like I’m growing still. I’m still getting better, actually, I think. That’s a good thing.”
Contact contributing arts and music writer Don Thrasher at donaldthrasher8@aol.com.
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