Los Lobos

Garfield High to the Hot 100

Los Lobos was formed in East Los Angeles in 1973, when David Hidalgo and Louie Perez met at Garfield High School and made experimental multitrack tapes on borrowed reel-to-reel machines; Frank Gonzalez, Cesar Rosas and Conrad Lozano completed the line-up. The name is Spanish for the wolves, originally Los Lobos del Este de Los Angeles, a play on the norteño band Los Tigres del Norte. Gonzalez left in 1976 and died on March 30, 2022, aged 68; Steve Berlin, formerly a saxophonist for The Blasters, joined in 1982. They played weddings and dances through the 1970s, adding rock, and made their first notable public appearance opening for Public Image Ltd at the Olympic Auditorium in 1980. The EP ...And a Time to Dance (1983) sold about 50,000 copies, which bought a van for their first US tour.

How Will the Wolf Survive? (October 1984) was their first major-label album. In 1987 their cover of "La Bamba", for the film of the same name, reached number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and in the UK. They won Grammys for Best Mexican American Song in 1984 and Best Mexican American Album for La Pistola y el Corazón in 1990. Kiko (1992), produced by Mitchell Froom, sold over 400,000, Papa's Dream (1995) was made with Lalo Guerrero, and Warner Bros. dropped them after Colossal Head in 1996, when they signed to Mammoth. They scored the film Desperado in 1995 and have side projects in Latin Playboys and Los Super Seven.

Their official site counts 24 albums and four Grammys from 12 nominations, and the NEA National Heritage Fellowship in 2021, with the Austin City Limits Hall of Fame in 2018. Native Sons (2021) won the Grammy for Best Americana Album. In 2017 they recorded "El Cascabel" on 1920s direct-to-disc equipment for American Epic, they marked fifty years with shows in November 2023, including at Garfield High, and the documentary Los Lobos Native Sons premiered at SXSW in March 2026. The Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement is dated 2011 on their site and 2014 on one Wikipedia list.