Dan Hicks: US musician who cut his teeth on the San Francisco scene before forging his own eclectic, original path

Disdain for convention: Hicks in 2012 (AP)

Stylistic boundaries were no obstacle to Dan Hicks, a true original of American music. In collaboration with his band, the Hot Licks, he melded elements of western swing, jazz, country, bluegrass, jug-band, folk and rock into a distinctive whole that he termed “folk jazz”.

Hicks, who has died aged 74 after a two-year struggle against cancer of the throat and liver, topped off this eclecticism with dry, witty, often sardonic lyrics, languorous vocals and a grouchy repartee with audiences. His disdain for convention may have been rooted in the San Francisco hippie scene of the 1960s, although it could equally have been a reaction to his father's military career which took the family from Arkansas to California when he was five.

The Bay Area, 50 miles away, was a magnet to the teenaged Hicks. Despite having learned to play guitar in 1959, he became the drummer in the nascent Charlatans. The four-piece were influential in developing the “San Francisco Sound” without achieving the commercial success of “underground” contemporaries such as the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and Quicksilver Messenger Service.

In 1967 he forsook the Charlatans and psychedelia to form Dan Hicks & His Hot Licks. The group (backed by two female singers he branded the Lickettes) showcased Sid Page on violin/mandolin and Jaime Leopold on string bass in an entertaining fusion of vintage genres. Hicks' colourful dress-sense and humorous songs – “How Can I Miss You When You Won't Go Away” was an early favourite – helped them build a cult following as they took their first three albums on the road.

Their debut, Original Recordings, featured a track that was a staple of his shows for five decades, the hauntingly elegant “I Scare Myself”, which became a Top 50 UK hit for Thomas Dolby in 1984. The title came to him when he ate a hash cookie which made him feel unsettled. “I took the phrase and turned it into a love song,” he said.

The 1973 LP Last Train to Hicksville sold well and put Hicks on the cover of Rolling Stone. He promptly dissolved the Hot Licks. Business had replaced fun, he explained, his confidence was shot and he was easily irritated.

Hicks soon resumed writing and singing, 1978's It Happened One Bite becoming his first solo release. In the 1980s and 90s he played with the Acoustic Warriors, who released the live album Shootin' Straight in 1994. Three years later he married his “one true love”, Clare “CT” Wasserman, and in 2000 he reactivated the Hot Licks name with a new line-up. Beatin' the Heat featured guests Elvis Costello, Bette Midler, Rickie Lee Jones and Tom Waits.

His 60th birthday bash saw the original Hot Licks reunited for a concert that became a CD; the mayor of San Francisco proclaimed it “Dan Hicks Day”. When he turned 70, Harry Shearer of Simpsons fame and Brian Wilson collaborator Van Dyke Parks contributed cameos to another celebration concert. Albums appeared at regular intervals before cancer tightened its pernicious hold. µ PHIL SHAW

Daniel Ivan Hicks, musician: born Little Rock, Arkansas 9 December 1941; married 1997 Clare Wasserman; died Mill Valley, California 6 February 2016.