Royalties aside, one can imagine Adele’s thrill at soul’s grande dame covering her “Rolling in the Deep.” Aretha Franklin kills it, with such awesomely casual fireworks you forgive the distracting detour into “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough.” Still, it serves the point of this delightful covers set: to show Aretha can still step into the pop world at whim with total authority. (Ditto the dubstep breakdown in “I Will Survive.”) Solid producers help: André 3000’s arrangement of Prince’s and Sinéad’s “Nothing Compares 2 U” has Aretha scatting giddily and quoting her doctor: “He said, ‘Aretha, girl, you’ve got to have fun!'” She is. It’s contagious.
