God's really got a hold on the soul legendfloating over the digitized grooves of producer Michael Stokes, Smokey Robinson's unmistakable alto sounds as angelic as ever on this, his first religious album. He teases out "Let Your Light Shine on Me" as if it were one of his trademark romantic ballads, and he dollies back from "problems with my woman" to counsel with his god in "I Have Prayed on It." Elsewhere, Food for the Spirit is dragged down by by-the-Book expressions of belief and heavy-handed social commentary, but Robinson hasn't sounded this into it since his heyday, and that in itself is reason to rejoice.

“The A Team”

This debut track from the then-20-year-old British singer-songwriter has a dark story behind it. Sheeran says he culls songwriting inspiration from "viewing other people's situations," which, for the heroine in "The A Team," involves drug addiction and prostitution that began as a teen. Sheeran paints the woman's trials with haunting imagery such as "But lately her face seems/Slowly sinking, wasting/Crumbling like pastries." "I did a gig at a homeless shelter, [and the song] is about one of the women there. It's her story," he said.