Cannibal & The Headhunters! The Beatles meet East L.A. sound! See them live!

It's 1964 and the Beatles are touring America and coming to the Hollywood Bowl. Who opened for them? The Stones? Kinks? Little Richard? No, it's a local East L.A. band, Cannibal and the Headhunters. Let's go talk to Robert Zapata about how he's keeping that music alive. He's been the drummer since 1969 and eventually became the leader. Let's go check out Cannibal and the Headhunters. So I'm so excited to be here at the Cerrito Center for the Performing Arts with Cannibal and the Headhunters. This is incredible. And I ran into Robert Zapata at the Irvine Meadows. And Robert... Pacific Amphitheater. Tell me about this group and we're going to talk to everybody. Well, this group has been around since 1964. The group actually started with Frankie Cannibal Garcia and three background singers. And shortly... That was in early 1964. No group, no band at that point. When Frankie, when Cannibal did shows, whatever group was there was a group that backed them up. Which is kind of the way it was done back then. Session musicians, the wrecking crew. When the group was formed, Cannibal's nickname came in a most precarious way. As a young man going to school, he got into a little scuffle and he bit a guy's ear. And they nicknamed him Cannibal. And that's where the name kind of stuck from that point on. And so that's the first part of the name. But when they were actually putting the group together... Frankie had got together with Eddie Davis from Rampart Records. Went through a whole series of things to finally get in the studio and record Land of a Thousand Dances. This is a big hit. In the creation of the group, there was an event that was going on at Carolee Radio Station. Strangely enough, Rudy Salas from the group Tierra was at this particular event. Him and his brother Steve, they were to perform as the Salas Brothers that day. And they were listening to the conversation. And Eddie Davis said to them, well we have... Rudy Salas mentioned, you should use Frankie's nickname, Cannibal, for sure. So they all agreed that should be something they should use. And it was Dick Morland that came up with the rest of it. Well, if it's Cannibal, you should go with the Headhunters. Cannibal and the Headhunters. So introduce the rest of your band mates here. Oh, well the band here today now, the band's gone through a lot of changes. We've had a lot of personnel changes throughout the years. On my far right over here is Carl Carrasco on keyboards. Who's been with the group some 34, 35 years now. And he's been a pivotal part of the group. And Dave Goldstein, another keyboard player. Another LA great. Originally from Rochester, New York. He's been with us about 23 years now, right? 23 years. And Charlie here. The minute I saw him do his thing, singing and performing, right away I thought, this guy's very much like Cannibal, somewhat. And even Eddie Serrano. So you're the reincarnation, Charlie. Somewhat. And not completely. So tell me why this music's important to you. Well, all my life has been in the music. It's one of the things that you grow up with, and something you always wanted to do. But you never really realized the fact that you might get to that point. And one thing led to another, and I met these guys, and I've been with them 23 years now. So it's been a great journey for me. And in terms of the history, in terms of Hispanic and Latino culture, East L.A., I mean, what does this mean to you in that regard? It means everything. Everything. From, you know, being who I am to what I am now, and the people that I'm with now. Without them, I couldn't do the job I do. Well, he also had his own group. He's being a little polite. But he had a group called the Ambertones, back in the 60s, who they were on the same label that the Tootles were on. Back in the mid-60s. Yeah, we had a couple of songs out that time. So it was fun to him, too. And Dave, in terms of the music, what's your favorite part of it? Well, as Robert said, I'm the relative new guy to the group, and I've been doing this now for 23 years. But I grew up back in New York State and have been in L.A. now for 30 years. A few years after I got here, I met this gentleman. And I've really come to develop an appreciation for the East L.A. scene and all the various East L.A. bands and the history of this group. When you think about a Hispanic-Latino band opening for the Beatles back in the 60s, I mean, that's a pretty unique situation. What do you think, Carl? It was one of the best opportunities, I think, for this group to come up with back then in the 60s to get their foothold in front of a large audience, such as the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and other groups at the time that were developing their own sound, which is unique for the culture of our musicianship growing up. My understanding, Robert, is Paul McCartney saw a Hullabaloo episode? Yeah, Paul McCartney first heard the song and loved the song. But in a normal, typical rock & roll band, as they're starting off, learning their craft, creating their music, it takes about a year or two years before you actually get to share the stage with maybe one of your favorite rock & roll bands. Well, it didn't happen that way with Cannibal. Within the first four or five months of the group's conception, Cannibal was on stage before the Beatles tour. He opened up for the Rolling Stones in Birmingham, Alabama, at Legion Field on May 7th. Back then, the Rolling Stones were called England's Great Rolling Stones. They dropped England's Great and went with the Rolling Stones. So it was the Rolling Stones, Cannibal and the Headhunters, the Righteous Brothers, the Beach Boys, Marty Robbins, and two other people that were performing on that particular show. And then three months later, that's when the Beatles tour hit. So it's kind of odd with Frankie. He started from the top, and where do you go? Where do you climb the ladder? Where do you go when you climb the ladder? Sinatra and Elvis weren't available. When Cannibal bought out of the music scene in 83 due to health issues and turned the group over to me, it was a heck of a job to keep the group performing in the status of those type of acts. And fortunately, I was able to hook up with a company called 30th Anniversary of Rock & Roll, Mr. Ron Kurtz, the CEO. And we ended up doing a tour called 30 Years of Rock & Roll for about nine years, opening up for people like Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, backing up, not only opening the show, but we also backed up Chuck Negron from Three Dog Night, Tiny Tim, Mickey Dolenz from the Monkees, Classics 4. So tell me what you're up to now, Charlie. What's going on? Well, number one, we're waiting for the show to come on so we can give it. Let's get in there. We want to do the show. We just can't wait. We're all excited about it. What's the date? It's September 24th. Don't forget that date, September 24th. We're all excited about the show. We worked real hard for it. And now that it's come up, we want to give the people what they want to get. And who else is on the bill with you? It's going to be the Midnighters and also a group from Oakland, the Bay Area, MOLO, which was a group that was started by George Santana, Carl Santana's brother. So, yeah, that group's going to be with us that night. We're right in the midst of creating a script for the movie about Cannibal. I was just going to ask. There's got to be a movie here. Yeah, it's basically my story and my experience working with Cannibal. I was 15 years old when I first started working with them. So it's been some 50-odd years now, 55 or so years. It's been pretty much my whole life in this band. So my purpose now, I think, is to keep Frankie's legacy alive, his memory, of course, and to keep this band working in and with the acts that Frankie kind of set from the beginning, which he kind of laid the bar kind of high, you know what I mean? So, and we do, we get the opportunity to perform again with Denny Lane, Joey Mullin from Bad Finger, and just a slew of others. So it's been awesome. That's great. So this is so great. I'm here with Robert, Charlie, David, and Carl. Cannibal and the Headhunters Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts, September 24th. Here's the information. Thanks. Thanks, guys. Thank you so much. Thank you, Pat. And that's our look at Cannibal and the Headhunters. What an amazing story. Thanks to Robert Zapata and the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts.