Marc Ribot: Marc Ribot y Los Cubanos Postizos (The Prosthetic Cubans) (Atlantic)

THE LAST time I saw Marc Ribot he was screaming into a microphone as his amplifier bled feedback, veins popping from his neck like battleship chains as he fronted the band Shrek. On the new Marc Ribot y Los Cubanos Postizos, he's caressing — and maybe just lightly kicking — the melodies of the late master of Cuban son, Arsenio Rodriguez. Indeed, Ribot has at least temporarily departed the hellfire and blazing atonal hoops he's put his guitar through in service of Tom Waits, Elvis Costello, John Zorn, Marianne Faithfull, and his own writing for the sweet, emotional core of Latin lyricism.