A newsblog for Virginia City, Storey County and the Comstock Historic District


The Virginia City News


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Dan Hicks, film & parade part of VC’s ‘hippie weekend’

 

(March 21, 2008) Virginia City will celebrate its 60s past with a parade, a film and a performance by the venerable Dan Hicks and the Hot Licks.

 

The event will begin with the movie ‘The Life and Times of the Red Dog Saloon,’ by Mary Works at 7:30 p.m. Friday, April 4 at Piper’s Opera House. Cost is $5 and funds will go to Piper’s Opera House restoration

 

The Hippie Days Again Peace Parade will be at noon Saturday, April 5 with a Peace Parade, and Hicks will perform at 7 p.m. at Piper’s Opera House.

 

The parade is sponsored by ‘Ol Virginny Ink, Virginia City’s only magazine, and all hippies far and near are invited to join the parade.  It will begin at noon at the Historic Fourth Ward School.

 

Dan Hicks and the Hot Licks, one of the most compelling and truly original voices in American music today, will perform a very special evening premiering new songs from their forthcoming Summer '08 release.

"Songwriting and song-gathering can be a life-long process" says Dan, who with his Hot Licks will be presenting an evening of their original folk-swing as well as a rare "sneak-peak" of brand new Dan Hicks songs to be featured on their upcoming tenth studio CD. "The well is not dry" says Dan, who claims to have found three new rhymes for the word "orange!"

 

Being produced by Grammy-winner Chris Goldsmith (Blind Boys of Alabama) the new CD will be  released world-wide in Summer '08 by Dan's long-time label Surfdog Records.

This rare performance begins at p.m . The opera house is located at 12 North B Street Virginia City NV 89440. Tickets are $25.00 and $30.00. For additional show information call 775-847-0433 or 866-422-1956 toll free.

Beginning as a drummer in the seminal 60’s San Francisco rock band The Charlatans, and continuing with the unique and legendary Dan Hicks and the Hot Licks, Dan Hicks is widely acknowledged as one of the central defining figures in American roots music.

 

 Hicks has earned a reputation as a true original with his signature eclecticism and humor.  He continues to carve his own way through a number of genres from proto-psychedelia to western swing and jazz; from tin pan alley to country blues, while always cultivating his own unique sound. The original Dan Hicks and the Hot Licks recorded five ground-breaking and Billboard-charting records for the Columbia, Blue Thumb and Warner Bros. labels.  

 

They toured worldwide and Dan appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone Magazine three times. The newest incarnation of DH & HL released the wildly successful “Beatin’ the Heat” in 2000, featuring collaborations with Bette Midler, Elvis Costello, Tom Waits, Rickie Lee Jones and Brian Setzer. USA Today called it “one of the blessings of the new millenium

 

That release was followed by the live cd “Alive & Lickin” in 2001, and the late 2003 cd/dvd “Dan Hicks and The Hot Licks Featuring An All Star Cast of Friends”

 

That project reunited Hicks with virtually every musician he has ever played and recorded with. Both Mojo and Downbeat Magazines rated it “Four Stars...one of the best cds of ’04.” 2005 brought the newest studio release “Selected Shorts” featuring special guests Willie Nelson, Jimmy Buffett, Gibby Haynes, Jim  Keltner and Van Dyke Parks.

 

Widely touted as the band’s best cd yet -- The New Yorker Magazine remarked “As great as his early masterpiece “Where’s the Money?”... truly superb.”  2008 will bring the release of  Dan Hicks and the Hot Licks tenth studio CD to be produced by Grammy-winner Chris Goldsmith (Blind Boys of Alabama)  featuring  all new Dan Hicks original songs with special guests.  This promises to be another classic addition to the truly unique body of work of this great American songwriter. To quote Daily Variety, “Dan Hicks is at the top of his game … unlike many pop artists today,  a new studio album from Dan Hicks is like a new painting from Picasso… STAY TUNED!”