Lauryn Hill / The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill by Sean Kennedy Columbia Records If you couldn't tell from everything else she did on the Fugees' bomb 1996 album The Score, Lauryn Hill's take on Roberta Flack's classic soul anthem "Killing Me Softly" should have proved beyond a reasonable doubt that she was the source of the trio's success. When I remember that album now, it's Hill's gritty, sensual alto I hear; when I recall the group itself, it's her viscerally commanding persona I see, dwarfing Wyclef and Praz into leftover munchkins. Well, the two cousins had their solo shots, and now Hill's got her own: an elegant slam dunk called The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill that shatters the backboard. Written, produced, arranged, and, of course, performed by Hill, the album fashions her 24-year existence into a finely-wrought collection of songs that asserts her fierce self-determination as a young black woman today. It presents an impressive range of musical influences as well -- reggae, gospel, R&B, soul, doo-wop -- all of which are filtered through the hip hop she seems almost to breathe. This girl knows how to keep it real. Shit, she's the real everyone's been keeping. Hill's miseducation starts with the reggae-tinged rap "Lost Ones," which bristles with shimmering anger at those who want to "play young Lauryn like she's dumb." The next track, "Ex-Factor," reveals her tender side, crooning over a failed love affair. Taken together, the two songs set the album's pattern: Hill alternately rhyming and singing, trading more hard-edged lyrics for more introspective romantic ones, continually shifting gears from one genre of music to another with stunning ease. "To Zion" is a gospel ode to her unborn son (whose father is Bob Marley's son Rohan) in which Hill compares herself to a modern-day Mary (the first of many biblical allusions), blessed with a "man-child" just as her career is beginning to take off. "Superstar" appropriates Jim Morrison's famous line "come on baby, light my fire" -- as well as a sample from that infamous song -- to criticize chart-topping musicians who only care about their dough. Bouncing between childhood memories, "Every Ghetto, Every City" vividly recreates her hometown of South Orange, New Jersey, and "Forgive Them Father," arguably the best track on Miseducation, is an eloquent interpretation of Marley's "Concrete Jungle." Hidden at the end of the album is a bubbling rendition of "Can't Take My Eyes Off of You" that's well worth the wait. The other candidate for best track is the first single, "Doo Wop (That Thing)"--old-school 1960s girl group cut with genuine doo-wop cut with fin de siècle hip-hop beats. Although Hill warns both girls and boys about girls and boys who are only about "that thing," I still feel seduced. In the video, she's on both sides of the screen -- as a pseudo-Supreme and as herself -- standing on a stage somewhere in downtown New York, singing. The crowd around her surges in dance, and if you squint your eyes just right, you can see that God is smiling.

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