(FORTUNE Magazine) – Nikka Costa Everybody Got Their Something Cheeba Sound

You put out a smokin' funk record, and what do you get? Tireless portrayals as a "female Lenny Kravitz." Tough luck that. Especially considering that Costa's sultry old-school jams bump and thump with fierce originality.

Gram Parsons Sacred Hearts & Fallen Angels: The Gram Parsons Anthology Rhino

He invented alt-country by marrying rock and twang. He sported cool sequined Nudie suits. His duets with Emmylou Harris remain the definition of honky-tonk heartache. He died at age 27 from morphine and tequila. Why hasn't the Gram Parsons movie been made yet?

Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros Global A Go-Go Hellcat Records

When Strummer was fronting the Clash, he sounded like the only punk rocker with a passport, spicing the band's blistering rave-ups with Third World flavors. Now, taking a page from his Sandinista! days, Strummer heads back to Latin America, returning with even better sonic souvenirs.

Thelonious Monk The Columbia Years: 1962-1968 Columbia/Legacy

As jazz pianists go, Bill Evans was prettier; Art Tatum was faster; and Duke Ellington was classier. But Monk, who sounded as if he was either behind--or way ahead of--the beat, was jazz's maverick mad genius (as this three-disk gem proves over and over again).

Chris Whitley Rocket House ATO Records

Usually when an established artist gloms onto the latest musical trend it feels like a desperate cry for help. Remember U2's Pop? Well, Whitley manages to skirt such peril with ease, gussying up his signature stripped-down guitar blues with a Technicolor coating of electronic layers and samples.