Los Lobos are among the bands both blessed and cursed to have created an indisputable masterpiece: Kiko, recorded in 1992 and produced by Mitchell Froom and Tchad Blake. It's a record of incredible inventiveness, welding art-pop production to the band's signature rootsy sound to create one of the few contemporary records worthy of comparison to synergistic masterpieces of the sixties like Revolver or Pet Sounds. It was probably inevitable that their 1996 follow-up Colossal Head should be a disappointment, but the album didn't suffer merely from comparison to its predecessor: it seemed as if the band, determined not to let Kiko's success go to its head (hence, I suspect, the album's ironic title), wrote with one hand behind its back, turning in a low-fi set that often sounded more like a rehearsal than a finished product.

Now that another few years have passed, with the memory of that stubborn masterpiece never far away, how does the new Los Lobos record stack up?

The short of it is that This Time, the band's first release for Hollywood records and their eighth long-player in 25 years, falls short of Kiko-hood but is still one of the strongest things they've done. The title track alone, a surprisingly downbeat album opener, works at an emotional level untouched on Colossal Head, as Hidalgo laments the passing of the days with one of his most sorrowful vocals:

Then maybe Monday, Tuesday
Won't go away
Then maybe Thursday, Friday
Would be like Saturday
And when Sunday comes
It's never too late
It'll be this time

This sense of days passed and opportunities lost continues in the next track, "Oh Yeah," a rare Rosas/Perez collaboration with a gravity not suggested by its throwaway title. The totems of a spent life are described with chilling succintness:

Where's all the time
Nineteen-ninety-one
Change on the dresser
Bed is still undone
What's a weary man to do
In nineteen-ninety-four
Hear the front bell ringing
But no one's at the door.

Saxophonist Steve Berlin contributes some wonderful work here, his ghost-like lines intensifying the narrative's sense of loss. Berlin's chameleonic sax playing is still a vital component of the Los Lobos sound, and he distinguishes himself further in two of the album's Spanish-language tunes, "Cumbia Raza" and "Coraz?n." The former is arguably the best--and certainly the catchiest--song on the album, a thrilling groove driven by heavy percussion and by Cesar Rosas' powerful performance on vocals. (It's a relief to hear Rosas back at the top of his game.) "Cumbia Raza" continues the album's remembrance-of-things-past theme by taking stock of the people and places from which the singer came; the lyrics, which are not translated in the album notes, celebrate the dance that links the singer to his forbears (the chorus ends on the phrase "cumbia de mi raza," meaning something like "dance of my race"). By contrast, Hidalgo and Perez's "Corazon" is more private and intimate, a broken-heart story that snakes along a sinewy bed of saxes and bongos and acts as a seductive counterpart to the more in-your-face enjoyment of "Cumbia Raza." For whatever reason, the Spanish-language tracks are among the strongest on any Los Lobos record, and one marvels to realize that this band, unique among its contemporaries, inspires fanatical devotion in an audience that cannot understand much of its material. (There's also "La Playa" ("The Beach"), about going to the beach and being naked and having fun. Perhaps they ought to start translating those lyrics.)

Throughout Los Lobos' career, there's always been a faint touch of regret or rebuke running through the songs--not preachiness per se, but a perspective that can't look at the sadness of the world without seeing the cause and/or suggesting a remedy. On This Time, Perez and Rosas combine their talents for "Some Say Some Do," one of the album's less-inspired tunes whose lyrics nevertheless provide a refreshingly irony-free reminder that good deeds don't perform themselves:

Who will clothe the children
When there's no shoes on their feet
When their stomach's empty
When there's nothing left to eat...
Some say an' some do

By contrast, the nursery-rhyme lyrics of Hidalgo's "High Places" mince no words: "The trouble with being in high places/Is when you're down nobody picks you up/'Cause you acted like a big shot/So what happened to the big shot?" Thick, crunching guitars turn the song into a potent warning about the dangers of pride, and a damn good rocker into the bargain. The album's closing track, "Why We Wish," ties the two thematic strands together, musing on the past while reminding us of the need for hope in the future. In a way, "Why We Wish" sums up not only This Time but Los Lobos itself, as its members meet their silver anniversary with a vigorous accounting of where they came from and where they're going. It's been a journey few other bands can take you on, and there's no sign it's going to get dull anytime soon.

Once a poor poor soul
Found what looked like a stone
And held it up into the sun
Saw a diamond shining
Forever it seemed
And his searching, searching days were done
That's why we wish...