To distinguish rock from Latin America from the "Latin" genres, the tall foreheads in the music industry came up with the genre names "Rock en Espanol" -- rock in Spanish -- and "Latin alternative." In this musical catch-all, the Mexican industry has some particularly quirky or iconoclastic bands that have forged their own way.

Among these, Cafe Tacvba (pronounced Cafeta Cuba) is one of the famed bands of this movement and one of Mexico's musical ambassadors. The band from Cuidad Satelite has forged its own path through a dozen or so albums over three decades, and it continues to do so. It's worth looking back to its earlier, classic period as its material has aged well.

Avalancha de Exitos (literally "Avalanche of Hits") sounds just like a greatest hits package (which would have been somewhat premature at the time), but in reality it is an anthology of covers -- hits by other well-known, and a few obscure, Latin artists. It followed the band's praised eponymous debut and Re, its acclaimed second album.

Never ask these guys what they will do for an encore, they'll surprise every time.

Like any great and long-lived musical institution these Cafetas have the ideal frontman, the engaging, ever-animated Ruben Albarran (or Anonimo), known for his range and energy and somewhat outrageous stage demeanor -- think Peter Gabriel, early Genesis with a Talking Heads vibe.

In brief, the rest of the band is Emmanuel del Real (keyboards), Joselo Rangel (guitars) and Quique Rangel (bass).

Instead of producing new material, here they take on eight covers of songs that might have been familiar to Mexican audiences at the time.

Avalancha provides a chill '90s take on "No me Comprendes," originally a hit by Cuban legend Bola de Nieve; and on Juan Luis Guerra's Dominican bachata classic "Ojala Que Llueva Cafe," they "faux-Mexicanize" it with frenetic violin playing and a singing style that is almost a yodel.

Mexican covers include "Alarma de Tos,"a song popularized by the Mexican band Botella de Jerez, as well as "Chilanga Banda," a cute rap in Mexican street slang -- just try and understand this if you speak standard Spanish -- popularized and written by Juan Jaime Lopez. "No Controles," originally by Nacho Cano and Ole Ole, later became a kind of anthem for Cafe Tacvba as its career continued.

The cover that seems the most obscure is "Metamorphosis," a song popularized by Axis; while "Perfidia," done as an instrumental, might be the best known to North American audiences, as Nat King Cole covered it.

I found this album to be a lot of fun, with a good pace, and it's intriguing to look into the songs and their origins. You get the feeling that something is going on under the surface of these songs but you are not sure, exactly, what it is.

As their encore to this, Cafe Tacvba went on to their oddest and most obscure recording, Yosoy/Reves, which nevertheless didn't seem to harm their long-term popularity in Mexico and abroad, but added to the legend. This is a band that is worth getting to know better, which you can do by viewing their 2018 live appearance on KEXP.