With her 1999 debut release Street Faërie, Cree Summer lulls her listeners into a tranquil, euphoric trance, then electrifies their ears and hearts.

A self-declared free spirit who revels in a mythic world of pirates and pixies, Summer shades her folk rock songs with elements reflecting her unique upbringing and identity.

Summer, the daughter of a jazz musician, spent most of her childhood on an American Indian reservation, where she became familiar with traditional native music and the music of Frank Zappa.

During the summers, she visited her grandmother as well as the musical stylings of Aretha Franklin and Dinah Washington.

Consequently, Street Faërie harbors not just a fusion of styles — jazz, blues, American Indian, and rhythm and blues — but also of emotions.

Summer, who writes her own lyrics, is confident yet vulnerable, sentimental yet critical, spiritual yet with an astute perception of her reality.

Summer's voice is like honey, and not the dull, soft variety that soothes a sore throat. It is the honey rimming a jar's lid: gritty and gravelly but still satisfyingly sweet.

Given time, her vocals, like the saccharine granules, melt into a smooth, husky, mouth-full.

The album's opening track "Revelation Sunshine" features some of Summer's smoothest vocals and offers a dreamlike warmth in its cadenced melody and rendering of a love that is pure and all-consuming.

Summer devotes almost a quarter of the five-minute-track to purring "Love is all around us . . . Look around." Instead of droning, this chant-like lyric is comforting and intriguing, as absorbing harmonies embellish it.

The bluesy "Mean Sleep" is a lively duet with Lenny Kravitz, who produced the album and plays over 14 instruments on various tracks.

Kravitz's electric guitar and vocals are wistful and passionate while Summer's harmonies and choruses are bright and soaring.

To a staid drumbeat and ascending mandolin melodies, Summer evokes her roots in the stunning "Naheo."

A recollection of her family and Indian heritage, the song pulsates with ache and reverence.

Finally, Summer unhinges around her peaceful edges in the biting "Curious White Boy," a timely song about an interracial relationship.

The sole "angry chick" song is anything but typical.

Sarcastic and spiteful, Summer heatedly spits out the mocking lines, "Another housekeeper fantasy Aphrodite, coffee colored remedy for yo hangover from history."

Summer's 13 tracks plead her listeners to recognize the simple beauties of life — a woman's menstrual cycle, a falling autumn leaf, the moon, love, friendship, family.

In examining her own past on Street Faërie, she inspires us to examine our own pasts, our own identities, who we are, what we believe.