In “Work It,” a sublime moment follows the setup to the chorus: “Is it worth it? Let me work it. I put my thang down, flip it, and reverse it.” The line sounds something like “It’s your femmy neppy thwen yet,” but what does it signify? By careful electronic manipulation, i.e., playing the song in reverse, the mystery line reveals itself to be … the previous line played in reverse. The concept is chiasmus, the inversion of the beginning of a phrase at its ending. It is a marvelous example of hip-hop cryptography, but not surprising coming from an adroit artist who has made a habit of breaking new ground.

Being queen of the hill has its numerous advantages, chief among them the right to select from the pantheon of hip-hop greats for guest appearances. To wit, Jay-Z, Ludacris and Method Man prove themselves to be good neighbors by pitching in on chart-ready numbers. “Back in the Day,” the Hova song, belongs to a genre that includes similarly nostalgic records like Notorious B.I.G.’s “Things Done Changed.” Likewise, Timbaland shows a predilection for old-school samples and beats throughout the album.

Missy scores the highest marks in the qualities shared by all gifted rappers: rhymes, flow, cleverness and style. She bends the rules with next-wave feminist lines like “Call before you come, I need to shave my cho-cha,” and especially “Pussy don’t fail me now” on the delightful R&B slow jam “P***ycat.” If men can exhaust the possibilities of their sexual prowess and endow their members with superhero qualities, why shouldn’t women do the same for theirs? Work it, Missy.

Like a modern-day Leopold Bloom traipsing through James Joyce’s Dublin, Meissner’s peregrinations take him across the city, moving in and out of its Israeli and Palestinian sections and absorbing them with his recording equipment and prodigious curiosity. The peripatetic theme is furthered by the elegant printing to the CD of a map of the city, marked by red numbers correlating, presumably, to the tracks of the album, each of which is named after a neighborhood.

On “Entering Jerusalem (Coming from the East),” Meissner layers particles of noise into molecules of sound, then loops them together over the whispers of passing cars and murmuring songbirds. On “Meets Electric Birds in Mamillah,” elongated beeps run alongside a slow loop that leads into a complex, deliberative composition. Each of the longer tone poems is supplemented by brief interludes of found sound such as a child talking about chocolate in Hebrew, a baby crying and an Arabic voice selling food in a market. An accompanying booklet contains a thoughtful collection of poems and short excerpts from writings on Jerusalem, each related to the district that inspires the specific tracks.

Several electronic artists contribute, but the sense that many hands are stirring the pot does not detract from this intelligent and timely work. The haunted tone that pervades the album is fitting for an accomplished homage to a cherished city embroiled in conflict.

Ultra Records has carved out a niche releasing genre-specific collections of dance music. “80′s vs. Electro,” the latest installment in the label’s series, pits a new generation of electro artists against their progenitors. Hence, W.I.T. (“Touch Me, Hold Me”), whose singer Melissa Burns gazes out unflappably from behind dark shades on the album cover, shares the bill with Laidback’s “White Horse” (1984), a perennial club favorite with catty lyrics (“If you want to be rich, you’ve got to be a bitch”) that continue to inspire modern fare.

A blissful example of blending old with new is Chicago electro-house impresario Green Velvet’s “Genedefekt.” Notable for its addictive Spy Hunter-esque synth hooks, “Genedefekt” runs away with the beat of “White Horse” and mimics its facile rhymes with equally monosyllabic lines like “pills for my ills.” In more sincere tones, “White Lines (Don’t Do It)” by Grandmaster Flash & Melle Mel, a timeless anti-drug gem from 1983, serves as a reminder of the urban roots of electro and its blood ties to hip-hop.

The inclusion of ’80s pop hits by Tears for Fears (“Shout”) and M/A/R/R/S (“Pump Up the Volume”) doesn’t contradict the collection’s title but seems a tad gratuitous. They don’t fit the bill of underground electro like, for instance, Kraftwerk’s staple “Trans-Europe Express.” Well ahead of its time in 1977 and a testament to the durability of the Kraftwerk lineage, the song meshes perfectly with both the classics and the nouveau electro songs of this compilation.

Ladytron belong to a genre whose proprietors are as likely to be deejaying by the runways during Fashion Week as digging through bargain record bins. In disaffected tones befitting catwalks, Marnie and Aroyo sing about blue jeans with “straight lines that cut through the seat like you want them to.” However, they also take a knowing wink at the cruelty of the fashion industry’s obsessions, singing, “They only want you when you’re 17/ When you’re 21 you’re no fun.” The final product is extremely tight, a dynamic musical score that never lingers on one theme long enough to play itself out.

Ladytron: “Cracked LCD”

Audio: Real Audio

Duration: 2:34