POP REVIEW : ‘Buckwheat’ Stirs Pop, Tradition Into Hot Zydeco

Stanley (Buckwheat Zydeco) Dural’s upwardly mobile brand of Louisiana roots music is remindful of that odd phenomenon that occurs when one stares into oncoming headlights.

The conscious mind intends to steer clear of the approaching danger, but the longer one fixes on the glare, the more likely one is to drift across the divider toward the other car. Subconsciously, the headlights become the goal rather than the object to be avoided.

Commercial viability would seem antithetical to the spirit of zydeco--a hyperkinetic, accordion-propelled, Creole dance music that originated in the mid-1800s with the convergence of Cajun, old French, African-American and Afro-Caribbean idioms. Louisiana-born Dural is the most visible champion of this indigenous rural art form. Yet, Dural’s conscious efforts to find a larger audience for zydeco (which include his appropriating the music’s name in order to become the artist most closely identified with it) are steering him away from the bayou and toward the bright lights of the city.

That movement is more evident than ever on his latest release, “Where There’s Smoke There’s Fire,” on which the four-time Grammy nominee is joined by music-media darlings Dwight Yoakam and Los Lobos’ David Hidalgo and which includes a cover of the Rolling Stones’ “Beast of Burden.” Such tendencies have drawn qualified praise from zydeco purists.

That said, it would be easy to dismiss Dural’s music as so much compromised funkiness. But it is much easier to be coolly analytical about recordings than about live performance, where zydeco of any stripe burns hottest.

In his concert Wednesday night at the Belly Up Tavern, Dural kept a roisterous crowd fully engaged with a generous set of old favorites and the sort of inspired covers that continue to bend zydeco’s borders.

In truth, much of the hardest work had already been done when Dural and his six-piece band took the stage at a little past 10 p.m. The opening act of this twin bill was C. J. Chenier, son of the late, legendary zydeco performer, Clifton Chenier. Backed by a revamped version of his father’s Red Hot Louisiana Band, the squeeze box-wielding Chenier worked the near-capacity audience to a froth with a long set of zydeco standards and zydecized rhythm and blues (Ray Charles’ “I Got a Woman”), ‘50s pop (Bobby Day’s “Little Bitty Pretty One”), and country (Hank Williams’ “Jambalaya”).

Chenier left the soup at full boil, and all Dural and the Ils Sont Partis Band had to do was stir it. It was a fait accompli for Dural, a master showman who manipulates a crowd as though it were the keyboard on his accordion. From the opening notes of the effervescent “What You Gonna Do?” from his latest album, he had those on the packed dance floor jumping, hollering, chanting, and, mostly, dancing. As Dural himself said after several selections, “They might be havin’ Mardi Gras in N’Awlins right now, but we gonna make Mardi Gras right here in California!”

It would be difficult to imagine a livelier set of music or a more enthusiastic, responsive crowd, even at the Crescent City’s renowned Tipitina’s nightclub.

But Dural conclusively proved that he’s more than a skilled provocateur; on tune after gamboling tune, his superior skills on the accordion kept the flame high. Like Chenier, Dural drove the music with chuff-chuffing rhythm comps on the squeeze box, but he also took frequent solos, and these, like his colorative embellishments, boasted virtuosic syncopation and rhythmic elasticity.

And, although his band was a bit overloaded in the guitar department--three guitarists made no more music than a single stringer would have--the outfit was measurably more polished and accomplished than Chenier’s. This was especially evident in the complex rhythmic interplay between the drummer and the rub-board player (the rub-board is a metal, shoulder-harnessed variation on the washboard, and is played with bottle openers).

In a compatible setting like this, Dural’s rock ‘n’ roll covers seemed no more market-conscious than the traditional tunes his zydeco forebears have been interpreting for decades. The ease with which Cajun-spiced renditions of the Blasters’ “Marie Marie,” Fats Domino’s “Walking to New Orleans” and Bob Dylan’s “On a Night Like This” fit into a set of more authentic songs served only to underscore the genre’s adaptability.

And the audience’s exuberant reception rendered any consideration of authenticity entirely moot.