Dan Hicks & the Hot Licks at Kravis Center 4/7

YouTube is awash with all kinds of bizarre videos, but if the site ever hands out an award for Weirdest Musical Performance on an Old Talk Show, a clip from Dan Hicks & His Hot Licks' 1972 appearance on The Flip Wilson Show deserves the prize. The rakish singer/guitarist and...

By Reyan Ali

April 7, 2011

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YouTube is awash with all kinds of bizarre videos, but if the site ever hands out an award for Weirdest Musical Performance on an Old Talk Show, a clip from Dan Hicks & His Hot Licks' 1972 appearance on The Flip Wilson Show deserves the prize. The rakish singer/guitarist and company start to run through a couple of Southern-fried folk songs when a laugh track shows up. A nimble violin solo begins; a faceless audience guffaws. Two Lickettes delivering doo-wopesque backup vocals elicit more canned hysterics. Within a year or so of the thoroughly strange exchange, Hicks dissolved the band — a move that ultimately kept him from long-term mainstream success. Then again, he's probably never cared for breaking big, as his potpourri of jazz, folk, country, and other genres maintains a brazenly antiquated feel. After spending decades doing solo gigs, he exhumed the Hot Licks name in 2000 and remains fervently active.

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