Lolly Vegas, Pat Vegas, Pete DePoe, and Tony Bellamy
"Lolly and I decided we were going to get back to our roots. Everybody said 'No, man, that ain't gonna make it, that ain't gonna happen. Indians don't sing.'"
Pat Vegas, Redbone member
Redbone was a Funk Rock band founded in 1969 by brothers Lolly and Pat Vegas. Their best known single, "Come and Get Your Love", was a Top 5 Billboard hit in 1974. They are the only Native American band to have reached that milestone.
In 2021 a graphic novel, Redbone: The True Story of a Native American Rock Band by Christian Staedler and Sonia Paoloni and illustrated by Thibault Balahy, was published.
Original Members:
- Lolly Vegas, guitar and vocals
- Pat Vegas, bass and vocals
- Peter DePoe, drums
- Tony Bellamy, guitar and vocals
Tropes applicable to this band and their music:
- Animated Music Video: "Come and Get Your Love" had an official video released on 2020. It includes animated historical photographs.
- Band of Relatives: Brothers Lolly and Pat Vegas.
- Braids, Beads and Buckskins: Lolly and Pat were of Yaqui and Shoshone ancestry. Peter DePoe was a Cheyenne ceremonial drummer before joining.
- Manly Facial Hair: Makes sense, given the band's start in The '70s.
- Magnificent Moustaches of Mexico: As seen above on the Mexican-American Pat Vegas.
- N-Word Privileges: Jimi Hendrix suggested to them that they adopt a name that reflected their indigenous roots. "Redbone" is an epithet of Cajun origin for people of mixed race
- Shed the Family Name: Lolly and Pat started out playing Surf Rock as the Vegas Brothers. Their agent had told them that the world was not quite ready to embrace two Mexican-Americans playing that type of music, so they changed their names from Vasquez.
- Title-Only Chorus: "Come and Get Your Love".
