A Hot Time in the (C)old Town

Review: Nathan and the Zydeco Cha-Chas at Universal Preservation Hall; Friday, Feb. 7, 2025

Three conga lines blurred into one as fans formed an unbroken loop through Universal Preservation Hall Friday night in the joyful geometry of zydeco on the loose.

In the kinetic near-capacity tweens to boomers crowd: unanimous smiles, waving arms, clapping hands and shuffling feet. Onstage: the five virtuosos of Nathan and the Zydeco Cha-Chas, throwing it down.

Obstacles stacked up against such unanimous fun.

Bandleader Nathan Williams’s brother Sid (El Sid-O, in song titles and the sign on his Lafayette club) passed last week; and of course there was the forbidding chilly weather. So accordion ace, gruff-voiced singer and spark plug bandleader Nathan needed a party as much as anybody. The weather never had a chance as big warm filled the place, though some dancers never took off their coats.

The band set fire to zippy two-steps, waltzes fast or slow, and a chill-out cha-cha or two – one called “Zydeco Cha Cha,” of course. Nathan sang in English or French and traced his musical roots back to where “crawfish got soul and alligators get the blues.” After most tunes, he playfully asked, “Was that all right to you?” – and reaped the affirmation it deserved.

“Zydeco Boogaloo” hit early (and repeated later), but a tune based closely on “Bring It On Home to Me” showed the band’s flexible strength. When Nathan’s brother Dennis Paul Williams broke a guitar string, Nathan revved his accordion riffs to fill in the blanks while (Nathan’s nephew) Jason George welded his rub-board scratches even closer to Keith Sonnier’s snare-drum hits and Nathan’s cousin Alan Williams’s bass lines hit harder, too.

Dennis Paul Williams, and fat Gibson

Gaston George, left; and Nathan Williams

They mostly played at full strength, but some sparser, more subdued interludes showed they could have played the whole show as duets, especially Dennis Paul Williams’s relentless Snooks Eaglin-style rhythm-guitar chords. He didn’t have to solo much to deliver soulful strength. George scratched the steel furrows of his shoulder-mounted rub-board with spoon handles bent away from the bowls. Sonnier’s snare-and-kickdrum beats stayed simple since so much was happening above, notably Alan Williams’s hyperactive repeating bass runs that pumped and pushed with centrifugal force.

Keith Sonnier

Alan Williams, and seven-string bass

The songs didn’t have to say much, so Nathan’s vocals felt like another instrument; they changed up the tempos and beats more than the formidably dense arrangements. The shuffle “Follow Me Chicken” jumped into a subterranean groove whose title I didn’t catch, then the two-step “Your Mama Don’t Know” eased into the waltz “Too Much Wine.”

Nathan paid tribute to his mentor Buckwheat Zydeco in another waltz, Buckwheat’s “Take Me To the Mountaintop,” a soulful, seductive bluesy guitar solo stirring things up and going call and response with Nathan’s voice.

The energy of “I’m Looking Forward to It” organized the dancers into conga lines; then, impressively, they built the energy back up that had been dissipated some by a problematic shift from piano accordion to diatonic “button” accordion.

No problem: “Sid-O’s Zydeco Boogaloo” – or was it the other “Zydeco Boogaloo”? – re-energized band and fans as Nathan went wireless and wandered the house, playing, grinning, sitting down among his fans, dropping to one knee to acknowledge dancers by the stage.