Blue Note Napa presents Los Lobos
Charles Krug Winery
2800 Main St, St Helena, CA 94574 USA
8:30 PM, Friday, May 28, 2021

Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2021 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2021 event list! ☸ On to the next event!

[8:43 PM] {lights down, announcements from C. Mondavi & Joe Martinez, band out, Conrad noodling Dazed & Confused, to considerable tittering and positive acclaim from the audience]

1. [8:46 PM] Tin Can Trust
2. [8:51 PM] Dream in Blue »
3. [8:57 PM] Maricela
4. [9:01 PM] Angel Dance »
5. [9:07 PM] Shakin' Shakes
6. [9:52 PM] C'mon Let's Go
7. [9:16 PM] Love Special Delivery
8. [9:19 PM] Flat Top Joint
9. [9:22 PM] Cumbia Mi Raza
10. [9:28 PM] Georgia Slop
11. [9:31 PM] the Neighborhood
12. [9:40 PM] Sail On, Sailor
13. [9:44 PM] Not Fade Away (jam)
14. [9:47 PM] Bertha
    [set ends 9:57 PM]
    
    Encore
15. [9:59 PM] Cinnamon Girl
    [show ends 10:03 PM]

Los Lobos

• Steve Berlin: keyboards, baritone saxophone, soprano saxophone, tenor saxophone, flute, percussion;
• Alfredo Ortiz: drums;
• David Hidalgo: guitar, accordion, percussion, lead and harmony vox;
• Conrad Lozano: bass, harmony vox;
• Louis Perez: guitar, acoustic guitar, jarana, lead and harmony vox;
• Cesar Rosas: guitar, percussion, lead and harmony vox.

Having heard last year when Bugs moved back to Mexico on account of the pandemic and shut-down, I wasn't entirely surprised to see a new guy on the drum throne tonight: Alfredo Ortiz, formerly of Beastie Boys & Gogol Bordello. He was certainly enthusiastic, even if he hadn't quite learned the full repertoire yet. Gotta get them to play more shows!!

It seemed to me as if the band was really psyched to play: blasting out of the gate with energy & gusto. Unfortunately, maybe a little too much low end in the mix too. Hard to know if that's a conscious thing (since I've noticed more and more over the past couple years) or just oversight, but I'm unhappy hearing muddy drum/bass thump mush. I'd much prefer clean and precise thump!

Continuing with the unnecessary whining, something was goofy with David's accordion near the start of Cumbia Mi Raza – maybe the mic got unplugged soon after the start of David's solo? – anyway, I was surprised to see the roadie messing with it while David was trying to play. It sounded to me as if that did the trick, but soon afterwards, David took it off and switched to a metal guiro instead.

Overall, I thought the show was very strong on up to Sail On, Sailor, but that one was a little rough – David actually apologized before they even started it, “we're still learning this one, and we need to practice it more.” Yup! It wasn't bad … just needs more work!

Not Fade Away was very energetic, but only the audience was singing. It's been so long that I can't recall if that's the norm for Lobos or not. And for whatever reason, the segue into Bertha was a disaster. Possibly even resulting in a full stop to get everyone back on the one. Over and forgotten once they got cooking on that groove, however, and plenty of happy dancers out in the crowd.

Seeing that the info sheet for the band mentioned 10 PM as a hard curfew, I was worried that was all we would get tonight, but after leaving stage for a quick breather, the boys came back out for a run through Cinnamon Girl, and the audience was deliriously happy about that. Lots of twirling and air guitar.

All in all, this was a really fun night. In retrospect, I think I should have picked up early show tickets – even GA in the very back would have been enough to get us “inside” – or at least we could have motivated early and come to hang out in the parking lot (since I'm sure you could hear the show jus fine there too – no ticket required! Gotta remember that next time!

Thanks to RasBobre you can listen to both the early and late shows via the live music archive.

Big thanks to Ting for the photo gallery!

Whoa! This section is incomplete for now, sorry!

Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2021 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2021 event list! ☸ On to the next event!