November 2025
“It’s good to be back here,” announced Los Lobos’ Cesar Rosas. “We played here a couple years ago I believe. At least that’s what they told me.”
Rosas joking about his uncertainty might have understandable. Los Lobos took the Grande Exposition Hall stage inside Reno’s Silver Legacy casino during the group’s 50th year together, as they played a couple co-headlining shows with another storied band rooted in the Los Angeles punk scene, X.
Rising from the 1970s punk scene, Los Lobos’ set touched on a few of the band’s albums from over the years. Opening with a cover of Thee Midniters’ “Love Special Delivery”, the group followed it up by transitioning into 1984’s “Will The Wolf Survive?” The group’s songs went as late as from 2006’s The Town And The City. Though about half of the group’s set was made up of covers – paying homage to artists ranging from The Blasters to Vicente Fernandez (“Volver Volver”) to Richie Valens (“Come On, Let’s Go”).
The group flowed through a few different styles – cumbia, big band swing, and rock with a Latin flavor that the band is known for. While having punk roots that can be traced back to Slash Records, a label they shared with X, Los Lobos opted to lean toward a more mellow rock sound, and their Reno show showcased their sound and vibe which would fit in perfectly at an East Los Angeles backyard party.
Having announced the co-headline show as having 99 years of musical history between the two bands, one could definitely get the feeling that most in the crowd were there to see one over the other. Though for each overheard comment of having never heard one band or the other, there was another conversation of attendees having seen both bands dozens of times, or having seen each dating back to the early 1980s.
After the brief intermission between sets, X took the stage with a burst of energy. Bass player John Doe spun and strutted across his corner of the stage bearing no resemblance to someone already in their 20’s when the band first formed in 1977.
Throughout their set the band leaned heavily into their songs from their debut Los Angeles album, including “Sex and Dying In High Society” and “Nausea”, but also performing spirited versions of “White Girl” and newer songs from their Alphabetland and Smoke & Fiction albums. Members of the group recognized that some people had traveled from significant distances to see this show and thanked those in the crowd who did so.
The room was electric as X’s set resonated with an age defying energy level fitting for a punk band. The audience filled the aisles and side stage areas of the Exposition Hall floor where they could dance, and the group returned for a final encore. While rumors directly from the source have been swirling around that this might be one of the band’s last few shows ever, as hard a pill as that would be to swallow, it was hard not to walk out of the hall at the end of the night excited by a solid lineup of two bands who built the energy to a crescendoing fever pitch before signing off for the evening.
Check out our past coverage of X and Los Lobos:
- Tedeschi Trucks Band , Los Lobos drop jaws in Reno (2022)
- Steve Berlin discusses Los Lobos Grammy winner ‘Native Sons’ (2022)
- ‘Llego Navidad:’ A Los Lobos Merry Christmas and more (2019)
- Los Lobos: Lavender moon breaks through Tahoe blizzard (2019)
- “The end was near, now the end is here” – Exene Cervenka of pioneering punk band X discusses the band’s upcoming Reno show (2025)
