Ed--May 22

Will somehow stumbled upon a copy of Striking it Rich, (1972) by Dan Hicks and the Hot Licks. Until I listened to it again, I'd forgotten just how much time I'd spent listening to their stuff. Never covered any of their material at the time, but the stuff OTL is playing now probably owes quite a bit to this music.



This one contains some Hicks favorites: Walking One and Only, I Scare Myself, Canned Music, and You Got to Believe, in addition to an enjoyable cover of I'm an Old Cowhand (from the Rio Grande).
While it is widely rumored that old Dan was a pretty hard guy to get along with, you gotta give it to him: he did take his music in a drastically different direction than most everyone else in the business was headed at the time. And though the cast changed quite a bit, he always put together some pretty good players to make it happen. Stalwarts in his lineup included John Girton on guitar, Jaime Leopold on bass, and Maryann Price and Naomi Ruth Eisenberg adding to Dan's vocals for a signature sound.
Those of us around Hendrix in '74 had a close encounter with Naomi Ruth when, after the Hot Licks were disbanded, she was playing as a sideperson for the late B.W. Stephenson (whom Steve really pissed off by introducing as "Cat" Stephenson at a Hendrix performance--but that's another story) . I always thought she was an okay violinist, but after listening to this again, I've upgraded my opinion of her playing. She's good.
This one holds up really well. I would recommend it, Where's the Money, or Last Train to Hicksville for anyone wanting to get a feel for the work the group did back in the early '70s.
Think I'll have another drink...

[note--June 7: I was in San Francisco this past weekend and got to catch a gypsy jazz festival up in Mill Valley. Dan played with one of the groups, Hot Club Sandwich. He played snare drum and sang. He was dry and wry, scatted quite a bit, and, like the rest of us, had put on about 70 pounds since the Hot Licks days.]