Absence makes the heart grow fonder for Los Lobos, the East L.A. Mexican/rock band who celebrate 40 years together with a tour which comes to the Yates Theatre with Leeroy Stagger, Jan. 23.
“Los Lobos has fans from many different eras, so we don’t want anyone to go home disappointed. We’ve been doing this for so long, we don’t even use set lists much anymore. They just start it off and let the audience lead it,” said 
the “the only non East L.A. guy in the band,” Steve Berlin from his Portland home.
“It’s all right to visit, but I moved away from there as soon as I was able to afford to,” he said.
“The other guys live about a mile away from where they were born,” he said.
“I don’t know why we’ve been together for 40 years. I wish I knew why. I wish I knew what the formula was ,” said Berlin, Los Lobos’ multi-instrumentalist / saxophonist and horn player extraordinaire.
While core of the band met in high school in 1971, they befriended Berlin’s band the Blasters in 1984 and asked him to join Los Lobos.
The band struck it huge in the ’80s with a cover of Richie Valens’ hit ‘La Bamba,’ but have been playing their own blend of traditional Mexican music and rock and roll since 1973.
A lot of the secret is not always being together.
“We usually tour for two to three weeks at a time, five weeks at the most and we don’t even do that much anymore,” he observed adding a lot of that was due to necessity.
“Even before we started playing, the guys all had kids and families, so we could only go out for three weeks, because after that it starts to fall apart at home. Even now it is a struggle to organize a tour for three weeks. It definitely helps keep the insanity level tolerable,” Berlin said.
They wanted to do something special to mark their fortieth anniversary, so they recorded ‘Disconnected In New York City,’ a live, more or less acoustic album.
“ As Dave (Hidalgo vocalist, guitarist) likes to put it ‘We play folk music for the hearing impaired,’” Berlin chuckled.
“It’s not what unplugged has come to mean today,” he said adding they delved through their vast back catalogue and chose some songs their fans always requested, and of course ‘La Bamba.’
“By our standards, it's pretty soft. And oddly, we’ve never done ‘La Bamba’ on a live album before, which is crazy,” he said.
“So we were able to get that done in a club called the Winery in New York City,” he said.
“We actually have to bring more gear for an acoustic show than a rock and roll show. There are a lot of different guitars. And airlines have size and weight restrictions for luggage, we often spend more money than we make to do them,” he said.
He enjoys acoustic shows more than full on electric shows because people are listening.
“ Acoustic shows are more personal. In a rock show, you can hide behind a wall of sound and a lot of volume. I like the excitement of an acoustic show and everyone is listening,” he said.
He said the band had to relearn a few key songs to do the live CD.
“We hadn’t played ‘Little Things for a few years as well as ‘Set Me Free Rosa Lee.’ ‘Neighbourhood’ has been part of our set for a while,” he said.
They often have to relearn audience requests.
“We played the Fillmore and someone shouted out the request for ‘Higher Ground.’ And we had totally totally forgotten about it,” he said adding they pulled it off for the fans.
When not touring with Los Lobos the band members have other endeavours.
“Louie (Perez) is a playwright, Dave (Hidaglo) is sideman to the stars, I produce records and I don’t know what Conrad (Lozano) and Cesar (Rosas) do when they aren’t with Los Lobos,” he summarized.
One of many projects Steve Berlin produced is Leeroy Stagger's new album, which they completed in about a week a year ago.
“ He is a great songwriter,” Berlin praised.
“ It was a lot of fun. He sent me 20 -30 songs and I picked the ones I thought would best represent him on an album. It’s out now. I got my copy and it sounds great,” he said.
“ They only write when they have to. I think they look at it as like a homework assignment,” he said.
“ If I can say so, I think my greatest strength is arrangements. Especially horn arrangements,” he said.
“I admire great songwriters, people like Gord Downie who can walk down a street and hear a melody in their head and rush home and put it on paper. It’s not something I can do. I’ve worked with a lot of great songwriters and I definitely count the guys in my band as among those,” he said.
It is tough to choose his favourite Los Lobos song.
“That’s a really exciting question. I like ‘Little Things,’ not so much to play but to listen to,” he said after taking a long pause to think it over.
“And I love ‘Neighbourhood,’ because it always turns into two, three or four other songs,” he said adding ‘La Bamba often turns out the same way.
He is excited to come back to Alberta for a couple of shows.
“I always love coming to Alberta. We have a lot of friends there now in Calgary. I’m just happy to get up on stage with these guys,” he said.
Los Lobos and Leeroy Stagger play the Yates Centre, Jan. 23. Tickets cost $65. The show begins at 8 p.m.
