Los Lobos: Dream in Blue

Los Lobos leaped into the national spotlight in 1987, when their cover of “La Bamba” became a No. 1 hit. But what looked like an overnight achievement to the band’s new fans was actually a way station in a long musical journey that began in East Los Angeles in 1973 and is still going strong. Across four decades, Los Lobos (Cesar Rosas, Conrad Lozano, David Hidalgo, Louie Pérez, and Steve Berlin) have ranged through virtually the entire breadth of American vernacular music, from rockabilly to primal punk rock, R&B to country and folk, Mexican son jarocho to Tex-Mex conjunto and Latin American cumbia. Their sui generis sound has sold millions of albums and won acclaim from fans and critics alike, including three Grammy Awards.

Los Lobos, the first book on this unique band, traces the entire arc of the band’s career. Music journalist Chris Morris draws on new interviews with Los Lobos members and their principal collaborators, as well as his own reporting since the early 1980s, to recount the evolution of Los Lobos’s music. He describes the creation of every album, lingering over highlights such as How Will the Wolf Survive?, La Pistola y El Corazon, and Kiko, while following the band’s trajectory from playing Mexican folk music at weddings and dances in East L.A. to international stardom and major-label success, as well as their independent work in the new millennium. Giving one of the longest-lived and most-honored American rock bands its due, Los Lobos celebrates the expansive reach and creative experimentalism that few other bands can match.

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Los Lobos: Dream in Blue

Los Lobos leaped into the national spotlight in 1987, when their cover of “La Bamba” became a No. 1 hit. But what looked like an overnight achievement to the band’s new fans was actually a way station in a long musical journey that began in East Los Angeles in 1973 and is still going strong. Across four decades, Los Lobos (Cesar Rosas, Conrad Lozano, David Hidalgo, Louie Pérez, and Steve Berlin) have ranged through virtually the entire breadth of American vernacular music, from rockabilly to primal punk rock, R&B to country and folk, Mexican son jarocho to Tex-Mex conjunto and Latin American cumbia. Their sui generis sound has sold millions of albums and won acclaim from fans and critics alike, including three Grammy Awards.

Los Lobos, the first book on this unique band, traces the entire arc of the band’s career. Music journalist Chris Morris draws on new interviews with Los Lobos members and their principal collaborators, as well as his own reporting since the early 1980s, to recount the evolution of Los Lobos’s music. He describes the creation of every album, lingering over highlights such as How Will the Wolf Survive?, La Pistola y El Corazon, and Kiko, while following the band’s trajectory from playing Mexican folk music at weddings and dances in East L.A. to international stardom and major-label success, as well as their independent work in the new millennium. Giving one of the longest-lived and most-honored American rock bands its due, Los Lobos celebrates the expansive reach and creative experimentalism that few other bands can match.

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Los Lobos: Dream in Blue

Los Lobos: Dream in Blue

by Chris Morris
Los Lobos: Dream in Blue

Los Lobos: Dream in Blue

by Chris Morris

eBook

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Overview

Los Lobos leaped into the national spotlight in 1987, when their cover of “La Bamba” became a No. 1 hit. But what looked like an overnight achievement to the band’s new fans was actually a way station in a long musical journey that began in East Los Angeles in 1973 and is still going strong. Across four decades, Los Lobos (Cesar Rosas, Conrad Lozano, David Hidalgo, Louie Pérez, and Steve Berlin) have ranged through virtually the entire breadth of American vernacular music, from rockabilly to primal punk rock, R&B to country and folk, Mexican son jarocho to Tex-Mex conjunto and Latin American cumbia. Their sui generis sound has sold millions of albums and won acclaim from fans and critics alike, including three Grammy Awards.

Los Lobos, the first book on this unique band, traces the entire arc of the band’s career. Music journalist Chris Morris draws on new interviews with Los Lobos members and their principal collaborators, as well as his own reporting since the early 1980s, to recount the evolution of Los Lobos’s music. He describes the creation of every album, lingering over highlights such as How Will the Wolf Survive?, La Pistola y El Corazon, and Kiko, while following the band’s trajectory from playing Mexican folk music at weddings and dances in East L.A. to international stardom and major-label success, as well as their independent work in the new millennium. Giving one of the longest-lived and most-honored American rock bands its due, Los Lobos celebrates the expansive reach and creative experimentalism that few other bands can match.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781477308523
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Publication date: 01/06/2023
Series: American Music Series
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 182
File size: 8 MB

About the Author

Chris Morris is a music journalist and disc jockey. He was music editor of the Hollywood Reporter (2004–2007) and senior writer for Billboard (1986–2004). His writing has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Rolling Stone, Spin, Musician, Mojo, LA Weekly, the Chicago Reader, Variety, and other publications.

Table of Contents

  • Prologue: Cinco de Mayo
  • 1. The Neighborhood: Life and Music in East L.A.
  • 2. Homeboys: Growing Up and Garfield
  • 3. A Beginning: The Founding of Los Lobos del Este de Los Angeles
  • 4. Recording por La Raza: The Making of Si Se Puede! and Just Another Band from East L.A.
  • 5. Happy Hour: Going Electric at Las Lomas and a Baptism of Fire at the Olympic
  • 6. Wolves of Hollywood: Los Lobos’ Arrival on the Punk Scene and at the Whisky
  • 7. Arrivals: Steve Berlin, Slash Records, T Bone Burnett, and the Grammys
  • 8. Quantum Leap: How Will the Wolf Survive?
  • 9. Breakdowns: The Graceland Session and By the Light of the Moon
  • 10. Numero Uno with a Bullet: La Bamba
  • 11. Rooted and Rocked: La Pistola y El Corazon and The Neighborhood
  • 12. Let’s Try This: Kiko, Latin Playboys, and Colossal Head
  • 13. Side Tracks: Papa’s Dream, Soul Disguise, Houndog, Dose
  • 14. In the Mouse’s House: Disney, Hollywood Records, This Time, and Good Morning Aztlán
  • 15. Homecomings: The Ride, The Town and the City, Tin Can Trust
  • Epilogue. 40: Back at the Whisky
  • Gracias Very Much
  • Listening, Reading, and Viewing

What People are Saying About This

Charles Ramirez Berg

"These peerless musicians created nothing less than the soundtrack of the Mexican American experience."

author of Perfidia and The L.A. Quartet James Ellroy

"Los Lobos is a slice of pure East L.A. that I never even knew existed. Chris Morris is a wildass ethnomusicologist, social critic, raconteur, and L.A. music bon vivant for the new millennium. Viva Chris—El Gato de East Los."

Previous review

" . . . pioneering border fusionists, multiple Grammy winners, and one of the two indisputably most influential Chicano musical acts in history, along with Ritchie Valens."

Rolling Stone Previous review

"With the exception of U2, no other band has stayed on top of its game as long as Los Lobos. . . . This is what happens when five guys create a magical sound, then stick together for thirty [now forty] years to see how far it can take them."

author of Latino Images in Film Charles Ramírez Berg

"These peerless musicians created nothing less than the soundtrack of the Mexican American experience."

Los Angeles Times Previous review

". . . pioneering border fusionists, multiple Grammy winners, and one of the two indisputably most influential Chicano musical acts in history, along with Ritchie Valens."

James Ellroy

"Los Lobos is a slice of pure East L.A. that I never even knew existed. Chris Morris is a wildass ethnomusicologist, social critic, raconteur, and L.A. music bon vivant for the new millennium. Viva Chris—El Gato de East Los."

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