Over the span of 12 tracks, Emma — as she bills herself these days — buries her plastic pop past by celebrating one of her favorite eras, the swinging ’60s, and a host of period influences. These include songbirds Dusty Springfield, Dionne Warwick and Sandie Shaw, songwriters Burt Bacharach and Hal David, Motown, the early James Bond themes and the bossa nova chic of Astrud Gilberto.

European critics and fans have wholeheartedly embraced the image makeover. “Free Me” was released internationally in early 2004 to sparkling reviews and strong sales. To complete the hat trick the album produced four hit singles.

The decision to release the set stateside, in stores Jan. 25 via 19 Recordings, is certainly based on a combination of its overseas success and the recent Top 5 showing of the dance remix of the title track, a bonus cut on the U.S. version of the CD, on Billboard’s Club Play chart.

In its original incarnation, “Free Me” is a lushly orchestrated plea to a distant object of the singer’s affection. Gilded strings swell as Emma plaintively coos the chorus, “Free me, let me loose to love you/Yeah, how I long to seduce you now.” Her honey-velvet voice — easily the best among the Spice Girls — is perfectly suited to the material.

The album is stocked with similar paeans to passion and desire but unlike so many current musical starlets, Emma doesn’t confuse sexual longing with being a bimbo. Rather, she projects the kind of smoldering yet offhanded sensuality that was the hallmark of the legendary sex kittens of the 1960s.

The caged tigress ferocity of Ann-Margaret, arguably the greatest of those sirens, is channeled to dizzying effect on “Maybe,” an uptempo slice of pop kitsch that ranks as the album’s most irresistable confection. Riding a gargantuan melody that instantly ingratiates, Emma belts, “Maybe it’s nothing, maybe it’s all just in my mind/Maybe I’m foolish, maybe it’s just a waste of time/But I don’t think so, maybe I definitely know/Why do I keep fooling myself? Why can’t I let go?/This is not like me, but now I definitely see/That maybe, oh maybe, maybe I’m in love.”

Joining “Maybe” and “Free Me” as European singles were “I’ll Be There,” a theatrical pledge of friendship and devotion, and “Crickets Sing For AnaMaria.”

“Crickets,” a Marcos Valle track that Brazilian superstar Astrud Gilberto (“The Girl From Ipanema”) made famous, is the only song on “Free Me” not co-written by Emma. It’s a risky choice for a cover — the song is quirky to the point of novelty — but the singer makes it work as she quick-steps through the lyrics while waves of latin guitar, maracas, handclaps and whistles roll in the background.

Latin tinges also imbue the album’s most romantic cut, “Amazing.” Performed as a duet with Puerto Rican heartthrob Luis Fonsi, the pair sounds like they’re unfolding an exceedingly delicate piece of gossamer with their voices.

The lone track that resembles anything like the material Emma recorded with Scary, Sporty, Posh and Ginger is “Who The Hell Are You,” a girl power sing-along that commands a duplicitous lover to “stop living a lie.”

In the scheme of the album, the song feels like a natural bridge to the star’s past — a pleasant memory that connects what once was to an album’s worth of right now.