These songs were written* and recorded on a portable cassette player by my dad, David Hicks, in the early 1970s. He sang and played acoustic guitar. This summer, unaware that my dad had ever written or recorded a single song ever, I found a cassette in my mom's attic, simply labeled "Dave Originals". I digitized the cassette and Matt Bullimore helped me clean up the old tape hiss and noise and with the additional help of Anna Hillburg, we recorded complimentary tracks and combined them with the original recordings. Think The Beatles Anthology, where surviving Beatles George, Paul, and Ringo added their own instruments and voices to dead John's demo of himself singing and playing piano and turned it into a full song with a band. In this case, my dad is John Lennon, but still alive and slightly less famous, and me and Matt and Anna are the other Beatles, soiling a legend's pure recordings for our own amusement and financial gain, but without the financial gain. The drums are slightly wobbly--keeping up with my dad's loose playing was difficult--and the instruments are matched as best we could to my dad's strangely tuned guitar. I'm super happy with the results though, and proud of my old man's songs. Enjoy!
*Update: After showing him these songs, my dad pointed out that "Bye Bye Baby" is actually a rendition of Crosby Stills & Nash's "49 Bye Byes."

Bye Bye Baby

What Have You Done

Worlds Apart

Abridged WTF with Marc Maron and Elijah Wood

Blood In The Bathtub

SPIRITUAL HEAVEN, starring Spencer Hicks and Amy Blaustein, was arguably the most exciting and influential band of 2006.

California Clap Records