For the week of July 18 - July 24, 2001

Not just another band from East L.A.

Los Lobos brings their eclectic talents to River Run

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By ADAM TANOUS
Express Arts Editor

To get some perspective on how long Los Lobos has been slugging it out in the music industry, consider that when they first played together as a band, Ronald Reagan was governor of California.

That was 1973 and four high school friends in East L.A., David Hidalgo, Cesar Rosas, Louie Perez and Conrad Lazano, came together to play rock ‘n’ roll.

Twenty-eight years later the band Los Lobos has found fame playing a wide range of music: from traditional Mexican songs, to the soundtrack of the movie "La Bamba," to the bilingual track "Cumbia Raza."

The three-time Grammy Award winner Los Lobos will be making a concert stop Sunday at the River Run Lodge in Ketchum. The 6:30 p.m. concert is part of the 2001 Summer Twilight Series presented by the Sun Valley Center for the Arts and Humanities.

While the band members began their musical journey playing what everyone else was listening to in 1973 — the Rolling Stones, Otis Redding, Motown and the Beatles — they were also heavily influenced by the political currents swirling about, namely the Chicano Power movement. It encouraged them to build a repertoire of traditional Mexican songs. With their name, "Los Lobos del Este de Los Angeles" (The Wolves of East L.A.), derived from a big Tex-Mex band of the time, the four musicians played in little restaurants, at weddings and parties.

In 1977, they put together an album of their traditional songs and titled it, "Just Another Band From East L.A."

Oddly enough, the band made their first big surge in the music scene via the punk rock audience. Members of the Blasters heard tapes of Los Lobos, and eventually helped them line up opening gigs for them and other punk bands at places like the Sunset Strip and Whiskey a Go Go in Los Angeles.

A few years later the band was signed by the punk rock label Slash Records. In 1983, they released "And A Time To Dance" with new member Steve Berlin. Their traditional track from that album, "Anselma," brought them the 1984 Grammy Award for Best Mexican-American Performance.

Two more albums were produced in the mid-80s: "How Will The Wolf Survive?" (1984) and "By The Light Of The Moon" (1987). Both albums mixed their traditional themes with roots-rock influences and both received popular and critical acclaim.

Perhaps what solidified Los Lobos in the national consciousness was their participation in the movie "La Bamba," a feature film about the life and death of Ritchie Valens. Valens was the first Hispanic rock ‘n’ roll star. While the film did fairly well at the box office, the soundtrack was a huge success; with more than 2 million copies sold. The title track reached Billboard’s No. 1 spot on its 100 Hit Singles Chart.

And just when most bands might opt for the commercial fork in the road, Los Lobos took the other path. Their next album, "La Pistola y El Corazón," was a collection of acoustic, traditional songs. Ironically, the group garnered another Grammy for the effort.

In 1990, Los Lobos produced an all-electric album titled "The Neighborhood." Two years later they brought out an experimental work called "Kiko." "Colossal Head" (1996) continued this experimental theme that some termed the musical version of magical realism.

Their achievements in the late 90s included working on several film soundtracks, including those for "The Mambo Kings;" "Desperado," which won them a third Grammy and "From Dusk ‘Til Dawn." They then produced the CD "This Time."

The band has also re-released their all-Spanish first album and a four-disc box set titled "El Cancionero: Mas y Mas" (2000). In May, they came out with their latest work, "Brown Girl in the Ring World M."

And after all that success and adulation thrown their way, Los Lobos still plays in little venues like the River Run Lodge. It is perhaps another indication that these musicians are just that — artists more concerned about the sound of their music and the experience of playing it than about the commercial potential of a concert. They continue to surprise their fans, which may be the true challenge of band that has been a part of the music industry for so long.

The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.