Sting has been so famous for so long and done so much — the Police, the rain forest, the tantric sex (or was it?), the luxury-car commercial — he has become easy to undervalue as purely a musician. The radiant Sacred Love is a vivid and frequently gorgeous reminder that Gordon Sumner is first and foremost a talented singer-songwriter. Sting clearly studied at the hyperintelligent, musically ambitious school of Paul Simon and Joni Mitchell, but he has consistently infused his postgraduate work with something his own: a wide-open global consciousness combined with a cool British reserve.

Sacred Love, the follow-up to 1999's Brand New Day, finds Sting in a soulful mood. "Send Your Love" pulsates like some twenty-first-century take on classic Stevie Wonder or Marvin Gaye, with a taste of "Desert Rose" for extra flavor. The gospel-tinged love song "Whenever I Say Your Name" finds Sting trading lines effectively with the Queen of Hip-hop Soul, Mary J. Blige. Sting and co-producer Kipper have smartly stripped back the polished wall of sound that has sometimes swamped Sting's solo work. The characteristically literate "This War" rocks as convincingly as anything Sting has done since back when Stewart Copeland was keeping his time. In spots — such as the sleekly trance-y "Never Coming Home" — Sacred samples some of the strengths that made the Police so arresting in the first place. Sting seems like a man focused on the future but drawing more freely upon his past with heart and soul. Sacred or profane, that's hard not to love.

“Is It True”

As the British Invasion reached its peak in 1964, Brenda Lee went from Nashville to London to record one of her hardest-rocking hits, her perky vocal backed by a stuttering, squalling guitar. That guitar was played by session musician Jimmy Page, yet to skyrocket to fame with first the Yardbirds and then Led Zeppelin. "She said to me, 'I've come here to make a record with the British sound,'" remembered producer Mickie Most. "She felt she wouldn't get the same sound in Nashville because they're only just catching up on the British beat group sound of about six months ago."