When David Hidalgo and Louie Perez take the stage at SOPAC on Saturday, January 16, for an evening of Stories and Songs, they will be celebrating nearly 40 years of creating music together—and even more than that as friends. That's one of the reasons, according to Louie Perez in a recent phone interview, they've been around as long as they have. "We were always friends first, musicians second. That's the key to it."

The principal songwriters of the three-time Grammy winning band Los Lobos, the two multi-instrumentalists met as teenagers attending Garfield High School in East L. A. "I went over to David's house one night for a month," laughs Perez. "We found we had similar tastes in almost everything—music, movies. Very eclectic tastes. We enriched each other, and still do."

In 1973 Hidalgo and Perez, along with two other Garfield High friends, Cesar Rosas and Conrad Lozano, formed a garage band rooted in the gritty, Mexican-inspired rock that rose out of the barrios of East L.A. at the time. (They were later joined by Steve Berlin on keyboard and horns.) Their first independent album was released in 1978 under the name "Los Lobos Del Este Los Angeles" (The Wolves of East Los Angeles).

For years, Los Lobos played at restaurants, community centers and weddings, sometimes getting fired for being too raucous and loud. But their 1984 album "How Will the Wolf Survive?" received widespread critical acclaim, and a large following ensued. In 1987, they recorded some covers for the Ritchie Valens movie "La Bamba," including the title song, which became a number one hit. Soon the band was touring the world, opening shows for Bob Dylan and The Grateful Dead, among others, and becoming commercially viable in their own right.

Over the decades, their sound became more eclectic and nuanced, incorporating elements of rockabilly, folk, jazz, R&B, zydego, as well as traditional Spanish and Mexican music, sometimes all at once. But the group, to the relief of fans and critics, never took on a political agenda. Nor did they abandon their rock 'n' roll roots.   

Through it all, Hidalgo and Perez remained friends. They are still very much part of Los Lobos, but for the last year or so they've been touring the country with a pared-down concert featuring original songs they've created together over the last 40 years.

According to Perez, the evening at SOPAC will be "intimate and informal, just David and me on acoustic guitars, playing, telling stories." Hidalgo's sons Vincent (bass) and David, Jr. (drums) will accompany them on a few songs. There'll be an open mike and a Q&A session moderated by Claudia Marshall of WFUV; audience members are encouraged to ask questions. "It's a pretty special evening," says Perez. It's also the first time the show will be performed on the East Coast.

Hidalgo and Perez have something else to celebrate this week: the launch on January 12 of a new album of previously unreleased material from their songwriting past. Musically and narratively, "The Long Goodbye" seems a tribute to their western American roots, and features spoken word passages capturing the "Crayola-colored stucco houses" and "roses and rosaries" of the East L.A. neighborhoods where they first collaborated.    

"We started this conversation back around 1970," reflects Perez. "And we haven't stopped talking."  

David Hidalgo and Louie Perez of Los Lobos, Stories and Songs, Saturday, January 16, 8 p.m., at SOPAC, One SOPAC Way, South Orange, NJ. For tickets and information, call the box office at 973-313-2787, or go to www.sopacnow.org.