Pop : Tanya Tucker Prances Sweetly at Greek

Wearing a black satin, low-cut, gold-trimmed, tassle-sprouting jumpsuit and a sparkly fringe-sleeved jacket, Tanya Tucker pranced and posed on the Greek Theatre stage Friday like a country-music Pia Zadora. She kept referring to herself as “T” in her songs, she made a dismissive joke about former boyfriend Glen Campbell and she just couldn’t keep her hips from wiggling even during the most tender moments.

Tucker seems truly incapable of embarrassment, and amid the Vegas-evoking gaudiness and artificiality, along with her rambunctiousness and unpredictability, she managed to be genuinely sweet and likable.

Upbeat, rock-flavored country songs formed most of her show, and she threw in not one but two ballads celebrating enduring, lifelong unions, and, although her nasal, raspy, twangy voice lacks the interpretive powers to deal with complex material, it was an endearing gesture.

Tucker, a child-star phenomenon in country music 20 years ago, has come through some stormy times to secure a place in today’s country world. She isn’t a great artist, but she’s an impressive survivor.

Second-billed Mark Collie has a trace of rambunctiousness too, and, while the young Tennessean is still raw and unfocused, there was a real magnetism in his intensity--he made you pay attention, particularly in a version of Bob Dylan’s “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” that found him leaving the microphone to wail the chorus straight and deep into the night.