En el Camino

The mysterious El Fantasma often veers closer to the rough-edged wordsmiths of hip-hop than the smooth crooners that populate the world of música mexicana, delivering the riotous corridos of En el Camino in a singularly raw but infectiously rolling flow. Boasting ballads like "De Mi Viejo," which erupt with gloriously over-the-top horns, the album certainly offers another instalment of his furious but catchy rendition of classic norteño. But it also finds the underground maverick sharpening his lyricism without dulling his attack on shout-it-out corridos like "En Esta Vida."