Los Lobos--Mexican Folkies at Heart

*** 1/2 LOS LOBOS. “La Pistola Y El Corazon.” Slash.

If Los Lobos fans were expecting the band’s next album to be a “La Bamba” sequel, then the all-Spanish lyrics of “La Pistola Y El Corazon” (“The Pistol and the Heart”) will be disorienting.

But the album should please tons of hard-core fans who have wondered when Los Lobos would record the kind of archetypal Mexican folk music that made them local folk heroes when they released “Just Another Band From East L.A.” a decade ago.

And except for the lyrically awkward title track, every song confirms the band’s remarkable artistry and uncanny sensitivity. In fact, this album is so roots-oriented, don’t be surprised to hear these songs danced to by neighborhood folkloricos.

“La Pistola,” however, differs from Linda Ronstadt’s “Canciones de Mi Padre” to the extent that it tries to re-create folk styles before radio and mariachis transformed them into popular music.

Besides “Si Yo Quisiera,” a Norteno waltz as gritty as any night at Main Street’s El Progreso bar, Cesar Rosas has written “Estoy Sentado Aqui,” a knockdown, grito-igniting ranchera you’d swear was penned by Jose Alfredo Jimenez. Puro norte, in other words. The other key to this album is the sones, the syncopated dance styles reaching back to the 18th Century and into the Mexican communal spirit.

But their rendition of “Las Amarillas,” a deliciously rhythmic malaguena-like son from the state of Guerrero, goes into a territory of passion some Mexicans may not even recognize. With allusions to beaks that peck and nests that squeeze, Rosas’ vocal gives us the earthy eroticism of campesinos ignorant of puritanical shame. And Hidalgo’s solos on requinto jarocho (a small four-stringed guitar) throughout the album are filled with soltura --effortless agility and grace .