Shakira is the strangest of all international pop titans: As soon as you dig beneath the surface of her sexed-up divatude, things get kooky. Featuring six Neptunes productions, She Wolf is her most blatant overture to American fans yet. But the weird stuff creeps in quickly: The peppy "Spy" is a meditation on masturbation, and "Good Stuff" is a string of musical surprises, from dancehall-style rap-singing to a ridiculously catchy chorus. Shakira's trademark warble is gauche, but whether boasting about sex on "Why Wait" or wailing on the guitar-propelled "Mon Amour," she's a charmer — a globe-straddling star you can cuddle up to.

“All Along the Watchtower”

Jimi Hendrix got hold of Bob Dylan's early John Wesley Harding tapes and in late 1967 recorded a version of "All Along the Watchtower" with the Experience in London. Dissatisfied with that first development, Hendrix brought those tapes with him to New York in early 1968 when he began work on Electric Ladyland. Eddie Kramer, Hendrix's engineer at the time, told Rolling Stone that Hendrix "was still looked upon by his basically white audience as the mammoth black guitar hero. There was a constant fight within him to expand himself." Hendrix's successful take on Dylan's work has long been recognized by the songwriter. "I liked Jimi Hendrix's record of this and ever since he died I've been doing it that way," Dylan wrote in the liner notes to his Biograph box set. "Strange how when I sing it, I always feel it's a tribute to him in some kind of way."