Johnnie Allan, real name John Allen Guillot, is a pioneer of the swamp pop

Swamp pop

Swamp rock is a musical genre indigenous to the Acadiana region of south Louisiana and an adjoining section of southeast Texas. Created in the 1950s and early 1960s by teenaged Cajuns and black Creoles, it combines New Orleans-style rhythm and blues, country and western, and traditional French...

 musical genre.

Born March 10, 1938, in Rayne

Rayne, Louisiana

Rayne is a city in Acadia Parish, Louisiana, United States. The population was 8,552 at the 2000 census. It is nicknamed the "Frog Capital of the World", as well as the "Louisiana City of Murals".Rayne is part of the Crowley Micropolitan Statistical Area....

, Louisiana

Louisiana

Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...

, Allan, a Cajun

Cajun

Cajuns are an ethnic group mainly living in the U.S. state of Louisiana, consisting of the descendants of Acadian exiles...

, grew up in a musical family, and at age six obtained his first guitar

Guitar

The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

. By age thirteen he was playing with Walter Mouton and the Scott Playboys, a traditional Cajun music

Cajun music

Cajun music, an emblematic music of Louisiana, is rooted in the ballads of the French-speaking Acadians of Canada. Cajun music is often mentioned in tandem with the Creole-based, Cajun-influenced zydeco form, both of Acadiana origin...

 band. About two years later he switched to Lawrence Walker and the Wandering Aces, another traditional Cajun band.

In 1956 he saw Elvis Presley

Elvis Presley

Elvis Aaron Presley was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King"....

 perform live on the Louisiana Hayride

Louisiana Hayride

Louisiana Hayride was a radio and later television country music show broadcast from the Shreveport Municipal Memorial Auditorium in Shreveport, Louisiana, that during its heyday from 1948 to 1960 helped to launch the careers of some of the greatest names in American music...

 music program, and shortly afterwards Allan began to play rock and roll music

Rock and Roll Music

"Rock and Roll Music" is a song written and recorded by rock and roll icon Chuck Berry which became a hit single in 1957 and has been covered by many artists....

. In 1958 he left Walker to form the Krazy Kats, and in doing so helped to pioneer what became known as swamp pop music.

That same year he recorded "Lonely Days, Lonely Nights" for the Jin

Jin Records

Jin Records is a Ville Platte, Louisiana-based swamp pop record label, although some Cajun recordings have also been issued on the label. It was started by Floyd Soileau in 1958....

 label of Ville Platte, Louisiana

Ville Platte, Louisiana

Ville Platte is a city in and the parish seat of Evangeline Parish, Louisiana, United States. The population was 8,145 at the 2000 census. Its name is derived from the French ville plate, or "flat town."-History:...

, and the song became a swamp pop classic.

He later recorded for Mercury Records

Mercury Records

Mercury Records is a record label operating as a standalone company in the UK and as part of the Island Def Jam Motown Music Group in the US; both are subsidiaries of Universal Music Group. There is also a Mercury Records in Australia, which is a local artist and repertoire division of Universal...

 and the Viking

Viking

The term Viking is customarily used to refer to the Norse explorers, warriors, merchants, and pirates who raided, traded, explored and settled in wide areas of Europe, Asia and the North Atlantic islands from the late 8th to the mid-11th century.These Norsemen used their famed longships to...

 label of Crowley

Crowley, Louisiana

Crowley is a city in and the parish seat of Acadia Parish, Louisiana, United States. The population was 14,225 at the 2000 census. The city is noted for its annual International Rice Festival. Crowley has the nickname of "Rice Capital of America", because at one time it was a major center for...

, Louisiana, among others.

He returned to the Jin label in the early 1970s and went on to record many notable swamp pop tunes, including his versions of Chuck Berry

Chuck Berry

Charles Edward Anderson "Chuck" Berry is an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter, and one of the pioneers of rock and roll music. With songs such as "Maybellene" , "Roll Over Beethoven" , "Rock and Roll Music" and "Johnny B...

's "Promised Land

Promised Land (song)

"Promised Land" is a song lyric written by Chuck Berry to the melody of "Wabash Cannonball", an American folk song. The song was first recorded in this version by Chuck Berry in 1964 for his album St. Louis to Liverpool. Released in 1965, it was Berry's first single issued following his prison term...

" and Merle Haggard

Merle Haggard

Merle Ronald Haggard is an American country music singer, guitarist, fiddler, instrumentalist, and songwriter. Along with Buck Owens, Haggard and his band The Strangers helped create the Bakersfield sound, which is characterized by the unique twang of Fender Telecaster guitars, vocal harmonies,...

's "Somewhere on Skid Row."

A perennial favorite of swamp pop fans globally, Allan has performed in Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

 well over a dozen times. He is author

Author

An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

 of two music-related books, Memories: A Pictorial History of South Louisiana Music (1988) and Born to Be a Loser (1992, with Bernice Larson Webb), a biography of swamp pop musician Jimmy Donley

Jimmy Donley

Jimmy Donley was an American singer-songwriter.James Kenneth Donley, a native of Gulfport, Mississippi, began his musical career playing in local bars...

.

A retired educator, he lives in Lafayette

Lafayette, Louisiana

Lafayette is a city in and the parish seat of Lafayette Parish, Louisiana, United States, on the Vermilion River. The population was 120,623 at the 2010 census...

, Louisiana.