Geno Delafose & French Rockin' Boogie – Everybody's Dancin' (2003)

Five years and a record-company-affiliation change later, Geno Delafose & French Rockin' Boogie return with their fourth album, Everybody's Dancin', and it's clear that the time between releases has had little or no effect on their musical approach. "100% Louisiana Creole Zydeco!" proclaims the album cover, which also appropriately boasts a foot pattern to guide dancers. Fellow Acadian Michael Doucet of Beausoleil joins the band for three tracks -- "Port Arthur Blues," "Belizaire Waltz," and "Les Flammes D'Enfer" -- and his fiddle is a welcome, if not actually necessary, addition. In French and English, Delafose remains an effective singer of zydeco material, though his rhythmic style is not best-suited to the Sam Cooke hit "What a Wonderful World," which he renders with little sense of the attractive melody. Otherwise, however, he is in his element, leading the band with his various accordions and adding to the party atmosphere with his vocals. The group has a groove born of hundreds of gigs per year, and the album sounds like just one more stop on their endless performance schedule, not that they turn in perfunctory performances. On the contrary, Everybody's Dancin' is likely to live up to its title (or cause its listeners to) wherever it is played.~William Ruhlmann