LOS FABULOCOS FEATURING KID RAMOS Source: Houston Press Date: 02/2010 Writer: Chris Gray

Absolutely Fabuloco
East L.A.'s Los Fabulocos have big zapatos to fill ? and are up to the challenge.

Details:
With Nick Gaitan & the Umbrella Man,9 p.m. Friday, February 12, at the Continental Club, 3700 Main, 713-529-9899 orwww.continentalclub.com/Houston.html.

Subject(s):
Los Fabulocos

Think "East L.A." and "rock and roll," and the first artist to come to mind ? provided you haven't seen La Bamba lately ? is probably Los Lobos. Understandable, but there have been plenty of other artists to emerge off Whittier Boulevard, from '60s garage-rockers Thee Midnighters to '90s roots vatos the Blazers. Now there's Los Fabulocos, featuring former Blazers Jesse Cuevas (vocals/accordion) and Mike Molina (drums), as well as guitarist Kid Ramos, who knows a thing or two about Texas from his eight-year stint in the Fabulous Thunderbirds. The quartet's self-titled 2008 album on Delta Groove is every bit as potent as its predecessors.

"It's a good mix," agreed Ramos last week, just before he left Southern California on the way to the four-year-old Fabulocos' first-ever Houston show Friday night.

Chatter: Were you a Blazers fan?

Kid Ramos: I was a Blazers fan. We did a few shows together; that's where I met Jesse and Mike. Big fan of theirs. [Ex-Blazers vocalist/guitarist Manuel Gonzalez] Big Manny's great. We do shows with him still.

C: Chicano rock bands, especially from East L.A., must have a hard time stepping out of Los Lobos' shadow. Is that true?

KR: I think there's always going to be some kind of comparison there, but, you know, Los Lobos has been well established for a long, long time. They have their own thing, and they've gone in some different directions. They're a stellar band, but I think we're coming from a little bit different thing.

C: L.A. is sort of on the western edge of the Tex-Mex sphere. What Texas artists is your band keyed into?
KR: Probably Doug Sahm quite a bit. And then all the conjunto music came from Texas, it's Texas music. It comes from the German influence ? there's a lot of German people that settled in Mexico. Conjunto music and norteño music, the accordion, they're basically polkas, and then the Mexican people put their own taste to it.

C: I was a little surprised to read your singer is a big fan of Bakersfield country.

KR: That's James [bassist/vocalist Barrios]. He really likes Buck Owens, but he likes Hank Williams and a lot of other country artists [like] Jim Webb as well. We all have different styles, but it blends together really well.

C: Not many rock bands, Chicano or otherwise, use bajo sexto either.

KR: It works great. I picked it up when I first got in the band. Jesse had a bajo, and he says, "Hey, can you play bajo?" I said, "Well, I've never played it before," so I learned the basic stuff and just went from there. I'm still working on getting better at it, but it has a certain rhythmic texture to it you can't get from a regular guitar.