'Old Farts' Los Lobos Rock Hillside Festival

Posted on Jul 25th 2010 1:00PM by Lonny Knapp
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Chris Graythen, Getty Images

After addressing the many 'young music lovers' in the crowd at their Hillside Festival gig in Guelph Saturday, Los Lobos singer Louie Pérez called his band a "bunch of old farts."
Sporting graying hair and expanding waist lines, the members of the three-time Grammy-winning band from East L.A., Louie Pérez (guitar, vocals), David Hidalgo (guitar, violin, accordion, percussion, vocals), Cesar Rosas (guitar, vocals), Conrad Lozano (bass, vocals), and Steve Berlin (saxophone, keyboards) may have looked like a group of aging rockers during the band's headlining slot at the Hillside Folk Festival, but after recovering from a slow start, they didn't sound like one.

Los Lobos stood stock-still for the majority of the performance and while debuting 'Tin Can Trust,' the title cut from the band's forthcoming studio album, Louis Pérez read the lyrics from a sheet on a nearby music stand. But as dual vocalists Pérez and Rosas traded bluesy jams for Spanish-language barn burners and Berlin (who looked very much like a member of Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem) coaxed cool runs from his big baritone saxophone, the band found its groove.

By the time they pulled out 'Evangeline,' from the band's major 1989 debut 'How Will the Wolf Survive?', Los Lobos was demonstrating the prowess of a band that has weathered the storm for more than two decades.

The audience, too, had weathered a storm, but by late Saturday night the inclement weather had passed. When Los Lobos closed the show with a spot-on cover of Neil Young's 'Cinnamon Girl', up in the cloudless sky a nearly-full moon and countless stars shone down upon the many revelers attending the Hillside Festival.