TK Hulin screening in Lafayette brings out swamp pop fans | Entertainment/Life

The “Cult of TK” showed out in full force this week for “Good Time Hard-Loving Cajun Man,” a film about the life and music of TK Hulin. 

Hundreds of people filled the theater at Acadiana Center for the Arts on Jan. 28 for the second screening of the documentary, which debuted at Southern Screen last year. The event was attended by a wheelchair-bound TK Hulin and his brother and bandmate, B-Lou Hulin, and many in the audience were longtime friends and fans of Louisiana rockers “TK Hulin and the Lonely Knights.”

They were the same fans that the film referenced as the “Cult of TK” — the crowd of young adults that followed the group from dance hall to dance hall in the 1960s and ’70s as they played their brand of swamp pop, country, and rhythm and blues. Scenes from spots like Signorelli’s Club in St. Martinville showed a packed dance floor as TK Hulin and his bandmates kept the party going all night long, traveling through an ecosystem of bars and clubs that is now largely lost in southwest Louisiana. 

READ MORE: ‘The building would bounce to the beat’: Saving one of Louisiana’s oldest remaining dance halls

The band’s local fame was thanks to TK Hulin’s charisma, energy and the strict injunction of his mother to only play nearby. Hulin’s biggest hit, “I’m Not a Fool Anymore,” made the Billboard Top 100 in 1963, and that year’s breakneck tour with stars like Jerry Lee Lewis and Roy Orbison made him lose too much weight. When Hulin’s mother saw him again in Lake Charles, she told him he had to get off the road and stay near home.

“Mama got what she wanted,” said TK Hulin at the screening, engaging with fans who have known his music for over 60 years. He said his mother was also mad at him for ruining a new $25 suit when TK Hulin had let a crowd of girls in an autograph line tear the buttons off. 

Hulin played his last show in 2024, a grand retirement send-off at Pat’s Atchafalaya Club in Henderson that turned out a crowd for one last party. The 82-year-old singer suffers from primary lateral sclerosis, a rare nerve cell disease, and said that performing the way he likes became too difficult in a wheelchair. 

“The songs don’t sound as good, and I didn’t like that,” said Hulin, reflecting on a 67-year career. When asked at the screening about his favorite song to sing, Hulin sang a few notes of America the Beautiful — part of his “American Trilogy” he closed each show with through the years, with “God Bless the U.S.A.,” “America the Beautiful” and “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” 

His voice may not be as energetic as it used to be, but the graciousness and bonhomie that shines through Hulin’s stage presence is as vibrant as it ever was. “Age has caught up with us,” said B-Lou Hulin, TK’s brother and longtime drummer. “It does make me sad because I’m not used to seeing him like that. I sat in the back on the drums, and all I could see all that time was TK’s dancing butt.” 

Louisiana Hall of Fame guitarist Ted Broussard was at the screening, reminiscing about his time playing with TK Hulin and the Lonely Knights in 1970, and again in 1983. “It was a lot of fun to play with them,” he said. “The guys in the band were just wonderful people, and I was in stitches a lot of times on stage. TK, his voice — he could have laryngitis, but he could still sing. I was stunned by that. And he was a wonderful showman with the dancing around. I was amazed he could do that stuff, especially later on in life. He was still doing it.”

Contact Southern Screen for information on how to watch “Good Time Hard-Loving Cajun Man,” a film about the music of Louisiana swamp pop musician and St. Martinville native TK Hulin.