West, Texas: The Town That Blew Up

David Pratka and Kenneth Luckey Harris Jr. met in 2005, through their wives, and quickly became close friends. Both lived in West, Texas—Harris several miles out in the country—and both loved music, if not always the same kind. Pratka, a computer technician, was a devotee of the wry, spare aesthetic of Texas country, and disdainful of the bubble-gum bombast of Nashville. Harris, a captain in the Dallas fire department who went by his middle name, was more of an equal-opportunity enthusiast. Both men played bass guitar. Harris hadn’t performed in years, but so long as he wasn’t on duty, he and his wife would be there when Pratka’s band, Spivey Crossing, played local festivals and bars.

On April 17 they were at Pratka’s house, a single-story, brick four-bedroom in town. The 41-year-old Pratka had recently set up a makeshift studio in the detached garage out back, and Harris, 52, had brought over his nieces so Pratka could record them singing duets. Harris grilled hamburgers on the back porch, taking breaks to poke his head into the studio to listen for a few minutes. Strongly built and balding, with a trim fireman’s moustache, he’d come straight from work and was still wearing his navy blue Dallas fire department T-shirt and baseball cap.