This is one of those albums that broke completely free of its genre and captured a chunk of the nation for a year. The soulful singing here certainly fits in with other artists that pulled off the same genre-exploding feat with Grammy rewards - especially Tracy Chapman with her debut and Adele with 21. But did that year of love for The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill survive the years since then?
Miseducation must credit Lauryn's voice for both its beauty on delivering a soul song and for her ability to also rap - not just credibly, but rap with the force, flow, and wordplay that some full-time rappers are incapable of doing. Unlike other artists that rap or sing but must bring in guests to perform the other role, Lauryn did it all and she did it so well. The album does a great job of showcasing her talent.
Where it is lacking for me is in actual album "construction." JD and I own this CD, but I have rarely listened to it after the year it was released because I just can't sustain an interest in the songs, although I enjoy hearing them when shuffled with other music. The two problems are typical hip hop ones:
1. Just because you can put 80 minutes of music on a CD doesn't mean you have to fill all of that time. There is a sameness that causes me to drift off and stop paying attention to the album during a couple of stretches. I've gone back and listened to songs that I noticed I had zoned-out on and upon starting with them, realised the song was fine, I had just been lulled by the fact it sounded very similar to the tracks around it.
2. Intermissions between the songs mess with the flow. Miseducation doesn't have as many skits and such as most of the other rap/hip-hop albums I've reviewed while going through the Rolling Stone Top 500 albums list, but I found the few intermissions on this album particularly distracting. The instance that is very annoying to me is the "class discussion" between "To Zion" and "Doo Wop (That Thing)." There is a great beat in "To Zion" that would segue nicely into the following track, but the intermission completely erases the rhythm from your mind and seems to make the gap between songs seem much longer than it actually is.
Songs I knew I liked: "Doo Wop (That Thing)" and "Everything Is Everything"
Songs I didn't know but now like: "To Zion"
Songs I can go the rest of my life without hearing again: As I mentioned previously, I found the "classroom discussions" between some of the tracks to detract from the flow of the music.