Preview

Okay, if you wanna dance, here's your chance! Keith Frank and his wondrous outfit are the current leaders and trendsetters of the 'Nouveau Zydeco' movement, a fast-paced style of Louisiana/Texas zydeco which blends the traditional with other forms, including R'n'B, rock, blues, hip-hop and swamp pop. Keith is the son of zydeco legend Preston Frank, and from the age of four he played in his father's fabled Frank Family Band, becoming its full-time drummer at the ripe old age of nine! After a brief spell in other forms of music, he returned to his zydeco roots to form the acclaimed Soileau Zydeco Band in 1992. Over the last eleven years, they've revolutionized zydeco music, playing non-stop nationwide across the United States and internationally to a large and dedicated audience, and releasing some ten albums.

Singer/accordionist Keith Frank's dynamic band is very much a family affair, featuring his brother Brad Paul on drums and his sister Jennifer on bass. Their music has been described as a combination of 'double-kicking zydeco, anachronistic but pleasing R'n'B and doo-wop, and accordion-powered reggae'. Famed for their marathon sets, we're certain that they'll have the Talbot's dance-floor packed in no time at all. We suggest a substantial bowl of gumbo beforehand, though - you're going to need all the energy you can muster as the 'bon temps roulez'!

The gig will kick off with an opening set from mid Wales' own Rees Wesson, the accordion players accordionist, and the UK's premier Zydeco band Joe Le Taxi, so get here early!

'... simply explosive ... works the zydeco faithful into a whirling sea of hand-clapping and two-steppin' guaranteed to kick up the dust' - ZydecoRoad

'The leading light in the evolution of zydeco' - Blues Revue

'Keith Frank sounds like someone who has every intention of keeping the dancehalls full for the next fifty years' - Orlando Sentinel

Review

If you'd been stumbling along Tregaron's Dewi Road at a quarter to one on the morning of Saturday 18 October, you might well have had a somewhat disturbing encounter with a six-foot-four man from Louisiana playing an accordion behind his back, accompanied by a small apprehensive-looking man in a baseball cap knocking seven bells out of an aluminium scrub-board. Asylum seekers? Radical windfarm protesters? Extreme busking? Read on, all will be revealed ...

Our marathon zydeco night was kicked off in fine style by top British exponents Joe Le Taxi, featuring the excellent Rees Wesson on accordion, all the way from Welshpool. The dance-floor was given its first seeing-to of the evening, and the mood was duly set. Coincidences abound on the Talbot gig scene - turns out the band's guitarist used to be a member of the fondly remembered Q-Tips, a band fronted by none other than our (especially you ladies) old friend, Paul Young.

Accustomed as they are to playing marathon four to five hour sets, we were expecting major value for money from Louisiana's Keith Frank and the Soileau Zydeco Band, and we were definitely not disappointed ... by Keith's standards, his two and three quarter hour offering was barely enough to cause him to break sweat. His sibling rhythm section (Brad Paul on drums, Jennifer on 6-string bass, both on backing vocals) swayed and rocked impassively as if born to it (which, as members of the Keith musical dynasty, they effectively were), Demitric Thomas on scrub-board (and vocals) was virtuosic on that ostensibly simple instrument, while the venerable George Lee - a long-term member of Keith's father's fabled band - was very effective on rhythm guitar, under the watchful eye and constant tutelage of Keith.

To say that this band has extended the boundaries of zydeco music to fit the demands of the 21st century is an understatement: they effortlessly add reggae, rock, pop, blues, even rap to the zydeco stew, and serve it up in a way that defies anyone to stand still. The seething dance-floor was testament enough to that, and as the hours rolled by the attrition rate of danced-out punters was in marked contrast to the band, who are apparently inexhaustible. Band originals ('Party Down', 'What's His Name', 'Big-Butt Woman', 'You Can't Keep a Good Man Down') were interspersed with quotes from the likes of The Doors, The Kinks, even War, and 'Blue Moon', 'Teenager in Love', 'Don't Be Cruel', 'Johnny B. Goode', 'The Twist', even the Batman theme and 'Old MacDonald's Farm' for Krissakes, make appearances in an unstoppable musical cascade. Keith's a great, soulful singer, and his accordion work is fabulously fluent and funky - not only that, but when he straps on George's guitar for a blues medley he proves himself the equal of many of that genre's leading exponents, too.

It's gone 12.30, and Keith and Demitric prepare for the show's climax, which entails their departure, still playing, through a side door, soon to reappear at the back of the room and thread their way back to the stage, on which the remaining band members hold down a funky groove. A good idea, in principle, but the security door slams shut behind them, and all other means of re-entry to the Talbot are by now locked and bolted ... the minutes tick by, and Rees Wesson is despatched to search for our heroes, who are in due course located, anxiously stumbling about, but still playing, in the by-now deserted square. Much urgent hammering on windows eventually gets results, reuniting the five members of this peerless outfit, possibly the ultimate party band on the planet, for a richly-deserved rafter-rattling ovation from the remaining punters. Another night to remember ...