We listen, in part, to find a connection between ourselves and this total stranger and few have been better at forging that connection than Lauryn Hill. To bear your soul like thisвЂ¦ that is what music is about, whether itвЂ™s hip-hop, R&B, or any genre. How could you (whoever this dude is) make Lauryn feel like sheвЂ™s not a diamond? That aside, hearing this makes me marvel at how Lauryn could be this good, this poetic, and this real. I won'tВ lie, this line has always pissed me off. вЂњNothing left, he stole the heart beating from my chest / I tried to call the cops, that type of thief they canвЂ™t arrest / Pain suppressed will lead to cardiac arrest / Diamonds deserve diamonds, but he convinced me I was worth less.вЂќ All our lives are so much better when you're a part ofВ them. Lauryn gave Flack's music a second life and re-introduced a whole new generation to the brilliant simplicity of those lyrics, and in soВ many ways that's an even more important accomplishment than if she had written them herself.В Come back to us, Lauryn. It really says something about the timelessnessВ of those words that Lauryn could sing them again more than 20 years later and they still feel so strikingly beautiful. вЂњStrumming my pain with his fingers / Singing my life with his words / Killing me softly with his song / Killing me softly with his song.вЂќДЄll praise due to Roberta Flack (and co-creatorsВ Charles Fox and Norman Gimbel) who wrote the original 'Killing Me Softly' that Lauryn's covered for the album. Even Dylan couldn't fuck with Wyclef on this.

'The Beast'В hasВ that perfect balance of meaning and a rhyme pattern that just hits me the right way every time. Twisting the proud lyrics of the our national anthem to reveal an alternate but ignored reality, here Wyclef stands up shoulder to shoulder with any of the best lyricists.

If I undersold Wyclef at all during the introduction, IвЂ™m sorry. вЂњOh say, canвЂ™t you see cops more crooked than we / By the dawnвЂ™s early night robbinвЂ™ n*ggas for kiвЂ™s / Easy, low key, crooked military / Pay taxes out my ass but they still harass me.вЂќ

The fugees the score full album