by Thom OwensJust three years after their "retirement," Concrete Blonde's Johnette Napolitano and Jim Mankey reunited to record an album with the Los Angeles-based Mexican band Los Illegas. The resulting album, appropriately titled Concrete Blonde Y Los Illegals, was a fusion of hard-rock and Latin music, leaning heavily on the latter. It's a stylstic departure that reads better than it plays, since the two groups aren't able to write a convincing batch of songs which would make their ideas more persuasive.