This is the most ambitious album Maldita Vecindad has ever made.

Ostensibly a concept album about various urban legends ("The Drunkard," "The Bad Luck Man"), it's really an attempt to tie together their fiercely political beliefs with their slice-of-life city stories.

That the album isn't entirely successful isn't due to their lack of talent as much as the scope of their ambitions.

Musically, the album is a funhouse.

Mexican charangos and mandolins give way to funk guitar,salsa meshes with rap, and one track is driven entirely by a Yiddish-sounding clarinet.

"El Barzon," a mariachi-rap-metal song sung from the point of view of an impoverished migrant farm worker, is a wonderful mix of humor and social protest.

The title cut depicts faceless monsters taking over the country (a thinly veiled swipe at the corrupt ruling party in Mexico).

A more personal track, "Tatuaje," is a tragic ballad of a lost love.

Interspersed are lighter tracks, such as a song about a green '50s Cadillac and an ode to skateboarding.

The band is clearly trying to cover all the bases, lyrically as well as musically, but the jarring mood shifts sometimes hurt the album's flow.

A more lyrically unified approach might have made this record a true masterpiece.

Still, by any other standards, an album this dense and eclectic would be judged an unqualified triumph.

Mostros proves that no one takes listeners on a wilder, more colorful journey than Maldita Vecindad.