For the past few years, the reigning queen of hip-hop soul has been slowly expanding her turf to include house music, through sleek, propulsive dance remixes of some of her biggest hits. Long obtainable only through import and promo-only DJ singles, these cult items are now available in a limited-edition CD. The good news is that it's a great workout soundtrack, full of pounding and energetic grooves. The bad news is that little of it is very imaginatively interpreted. Most of the remixes — such as Junior Vasquez's dated retooling of "Your Child" — simply edit Blige's original vocals and then slot them over bombastic, beat-heavy tracks that heavily recall recent remakings of Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey tracks. Still, the wistful funkiness of the disco-tinged "Give Me You" and "Everything" make this collection worth owning for Mary completists.

“Karma Chameleon”

Boy George has said this song was about standing by what you believe in. However, at the time, he was involved in a secret affair with Culture Club drummer Jon Moss. "Now people can understand the songs better," he said. "They were written about my relationship with Jon, and they were also written about being a gay man in a homophobic world." The lines "If I listen to your lies, would you say/I'm a man without conviction/I'm a man who doesn't know how to sell a contradiction," described his life at the time, he said. "I was selling this big lie."