Back to the lair
Los Lobos are coming home. After exploring their Mexican-American
heritage with two projects — songs for the movie La Bamba, including
the No. 1 title hit, and an album of traditional Mexican music, La
Pistola y el Corazon — the group returns to flat-out rock on
The Neighborhood. While the September release deals heavily with the
East Los Angeles area the band hails from, drummer-lyricist Louie
Perez says the group didn't start with a theme in mind. ''It grew into
that over the past year,'' he explains. ''There was never a master
plan. As a group, we seem to work on an organic level. It drives our
management nuts.'' In fact, most of the songs on the album were
written before Perez and singer-guitarist David Hidalgo came up with
the title cut, about a struggling family in the inner city. At that
point, Perez says, ''It made the other songs make sense.''
3 BR, 5 HRD RCKRS
Aeroforce One, the fan club for Boston band Aerosmith, has
launched a letter-writing campaign to local officials to have the
group's old apartment made into a historic landmark. From 1970 to
1972 the quintet lived at 1325 Commonwealth Avenue, Apartment 2B, in
a three-bedroom space. Jeff Myerow, a 28-year-old Boston-area
housepainter and musician who has seen the group over 40 times, came
up with the idea. ''I think it would be real cool to make a landmark
out of it,'' Myerow says. ''Aerosmith is one of the biggest success
stories to come out of Boston. I think they should turn it into a
museum with (band) relics.''
Zep in a box
Former Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page is overseeing a boxed set
of that supergroup's work. The four-CD project, as
yet untitled, is tentatively scheduled for a late October release.
Among the 54 cuts will be three unreleased performances, two taken
from live BBC broadcasts: ''Traveling Riverside Blues'' and an
eight-minute instrumental medley of ''White Summer'' and ''Black
Mountainside.'' Band members Robert Plant and John Paul Jones approved
the music selection and extensive liner notes along with Page
(drummer John Bonham died in 1980), and Page supervised the digital
remastering of the original session material. ''I think he wanted to
make sure the music sounded as good as it possibly could,'' says a
spokesman.
Still crazy after all these years
Success may have warped other rock & roll artists, but not Was
(Not Was). They were already producing zany postmodern funk
before their 1988 album, What Up, Dog?, launched two major hits, ''Spy
in the House of Love'' and ''Walk the Dinosaur.'' The same blend of
smooth soul, riveting dance-floor rhythms, and psychotic monologues
dominates the new Was (Not Was) album, Are You Okay?, only in a less
exaggerated fashion. ''I think we found ourselves a niche instead of
trying to out-eclecticize ourselves,'' says David Was (ne Weiss).
After playing the songs from What Up, Dog? on an extensive tour, Was
says, ''We decided not to be the Sybils of the music business, with
seven distinct musical personalities on the same record.'' Was and his
musical partner Don Was (né Fagenson) also exorcised some of their
diverse tendencies by producing other acts, including the Bob Dylan
effort due next month. On his own, Don Was has produced Bonnie
Raitt's Nick of Time, as well as new albums by Iggy Pop and Bob
Seger. Next year David Was hopes to do a solo record, to include ''all
the bad behavior that no longer fits on our album because of our
burgeoning career.''
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