Dan Hicks started out on the early-1960s West Coast folk circuit before becoming a member of pioneering Bay Area folk-rock band the Charlatans, forerunners of the whole San Francisco '60s rock scene. By the decade's end, Hicks was leading his own band, the Hot Licks, and playing a quirky combination of country, folk, Western swing, hot jazz, and old-timey sounds. In the mid-'70s, he disbanded the Hot Licks, and abandoned recording for several years, but by the '90s Hicks was back with a new band, the Acoustic Warriors, and he eventually put together a new version of the Hot Licks.