Salutes the Bob Wills ERA

Album Review

Over the years, Texas has given us some fascinating musical hybrids. Norteño/Tex-Mex was created when Mexican-Americans in Southern Texas combined their ranchera music with the polka beat that German immigrants exposed them to — and that unlikely ranchera/polka mixture is no more unlikely than Western swing, which combines country and jazz (mainly classic jazz and swing). That hillbilly/jazz hybrid is a lot like the New York City restaurants that have a part-Latin, part-Chinese menu — it might sound strange if you haven't tried it, but it works surprisingly well. Although Western swing's peak years were the 1930s and '40s, the style continues to have quite a following in the 21st century. This 70-minute CD finds veteran singer/guitarist Nolan Bruce Allen paying tribute to Western swing's golden years — a time when Bob Wills, Milton Brown, and their colleagues showed the world what could happen if Jimmie Rodgers' fans were also Duke Ellington fans. Allen doesn't pretend to reinvent the Western swing wheel; whether the Alabama native is embracing Wills' "Faded Love," or Earl Hines' "Rosetta," he is quite faithful to the classic Western swing sound of the 1930s and '40s. The results are predictable, of course (few surprises occur), but the results are pleasing and enjoyable. Allen (who recorded this album in Dallas) sings with a folksy, unpretentious, down-home sort of charm, which is exactly what a vocalist needs if he or she is going to perform this type of music convincingly. Someone who has a more casual interest in Western swing would be better off starting out with a best-of collection by Bob Wills; novices can't go wrong with Rhino's excellent two-CD set Anthology 1935-1973. But the more seasoned Western swing collectors will find that with Salutes the Bob Wills Era, Allen has provided a solid and rewarding tribute album to the genre's golden era.