Tuesday, April 16, 2019

Los Lobos - Live Classic Rock Cover Versions (1994-2000)

Before I post any more albums of studio stray tracks by Los Lobos, I want to post this album. I made it because I noticed a big number of classic rock songs played live by the band in the 1990s. There were so many from 1994 to 2000 that I decided to put them all together on an album. And it's an extra long album compared to what I usually post, at an hour and five minutes.

One reason I like Los Lobos so much is because they take wildly disparate types of music, from Mexican folk to experimental art rock to classic rock, and blend them together to make their own style. This album shows clearly the classic rock artists that influenced them the most. Here is who the songs on this album are originally by, in order:

01 Tomorrow Never Knows - Beatles
02 Spanish Castle Magic - Jimi Hendrix
03 Bertha - Grateful Dead
04 Don't Keep Me Wondering - Allman Brothers
05 What's Going On - Marvin Gaye
06 Waiting in Vain - Bob Marley
07 One Way Out - Allman Brothers
08 Cinnamon Girl - Neil Young
09 Rattlesnake Shake - Dear Mr. Fantasy - Fleetwood Mac - Traffic
10 Down by the River - Neil Young
11 Natural Mystic - No More Trouble  - Bob Marley
12 Oye Como Va - Santana

Those are a lot of my favorite artists too. I'll probably post something by all of them by and by.

This is the only Los Lobos album I've made like this because although they've continued to play classic rock covers in concert since 2000, they're mostly this same bunch of songs. I haven't found nearly enough different cover songs after 2000 to make another album. (At least not yet.)

Note that I included Los Lobos doing a version of "Bertha" on a previous stray tracks album. But that was their studio version, and this is live. I also included them doing "What's Going On" on another previous stray tracks album. But that was also done in a studio (in front of a small audience). Plus, that was Los Lobos, while this is their closely related spin-off band Los Super Seven, with Sheryl Crow doing some of the singing, so I figured it was different enough to be interesting.

By the way, Los Lobos has freely allowed tapers at their concerts for many years, so that means there are a lot of high quality bootlegs of them. That in turn means the sound quality here is typically excellent for live recordings. Three of the songs here are officially released and the rest come from bootlegs, but you can't tell which is which from the sound quality.

01 Tomorrow Never Knows (Los Lobos)
02 Spanish Castle Magic (Los Lobos)
03 Bertha (Los Lobos)
04 Don't Keep Me Wondering (Los Lobos)
05 What's Going On (Los Super Seven & Sheryl Crow)
06 Waiting in Vain (Los Lobos)
07 One Way Out (Los Lobos)
08 Cinnamon Girl (Los Lobos)
09 Rattlesnake Shake - Dear Mr. Fantasy (Los Lobos)
10 Down by the River (Los Lobos)
11 Natural Mystic - No More Trouble (Los Lobos)
12 Oye Como Va (Los Lobos)

https://www.imagenetz.de/etaNL

I'm really happy at how the cover art worked out. I found a concert poster of Los Lobos playing the Fillmore in San Francisco in 1998. It depicts a giant scorpion attacking San Francisco. All I did was crop it to fit the square space, then change the text on the green billboard.

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