live music review: lauryn hill
Last Friday night, in Montclair, New Jersey, I witnessed a rebirth in the making. Call it a renaissance if you will: Lauryn Hill is back.
Easily one of the most influential singers of all time after the phenomenal success of 1998’s The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, this five-time Grammy winner went on a true hiatus for about five years. Her whereabouts were largely unknown, her only comments made in public were strange, the media decided she was crazy, racist and insane. I’m not sure who is wrong or right in these claims, but the bottom line is, it doesn’t matter. Give her a large backing band and a microphone, and just enjoy the show. She absolutely killed her set on stage.
Ms. Hill was about an hour and a half late to the show, which was to be expected because friends of mine who had been lucky enough to get tickets to her previous six New York metro area shows earlier this winter informed me of her tardiness. I have only ever waited as long to see Stevie Wonder, deadmau5 and Kid CuDi, but all of those were on late at night at one of the biggest music festivals in the United States, so the mindset was different. I had been up early and worked a full day before heading to NJ to see the show, but as soon as she came on, it was over.
In my relatively short life, I’ve seen living legends from all different genres perform: Willie Nelson, Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young, Stevie Wonder, Jay-Z, Bruce Springsteen, Sufjan Stevens, John Legend, the Black Keys, Sigur Rós, Florence + the Machine, the cast of Glee, and even Kanye West (who asked her to come back on the song “Champion” when he rapped “Lauryn Hill say her heart was in Zion,/ I wish her heart was still in rhymin’”). The thrill of a seeing an artist you love more than life itself is the absolute best thing about live music, and the wait for Lauryn Hill was well worth it. Before starting, she acknowledged her absence from music but stressed that her music has never changed its message. That idea became the whole attitude of the show – I had to forgive everything I had heard and erase all the expectations I had before really enjoying her performance.
Her nine piece backing band was amazingly talented, but their size was a little too big for the theatre. For the first ten minutes of her set, Lauryn was complaining to the sound guys about her vocals. About three songs in though, everything clicked. She started out with some gospel and reggae-inspired songs that showed off the versatility of her supporting instrumentalists and quickly went into her own classics. These songs, like “Lost Ones” were re-worked, of course, but perfectly showcased her award-winning talent. She gave everything – screaming, scatting, rapping, singing, talking – and it was like she’d never been out of the limelight. I was in fifth grade when her album made its debut, and while I must admit that it was strange to see these songs I had grown up with being performed in front of me fifteen years later, it only took about five minutes for me to be on her side again.
The next portion of her set featured reggae songs like “Turn Your Lights Down Low” before heading into Fugees classics. This was probably my favorite part of the set, simply because there were no renditions here: she delivered hip-hop classic after hip-hop classic and we didn’t have to guess where she was going with the sound. My absolute favorite of the night was “Ready or Not” – it was an excellent version that allowed her to show off her Renaissance woman showmanship. She kept the energy up and performed both the rapped and sung vocals perfectly.
After that portion of her set, she went into what was to become her encore. She performed an extended 10+-minute version of “To Zion”, during which she brought out three of her children and four other young family members out on stage. Each of these children was given his or her chance to shine onstage, and strangely her now 14-year-old son Zion was the least interested. That part of the show was interesting because Lauryn showed such a notoriously private part of her life with the audience. After the kids exited, she closed with “Doo Wop (That Thing)”, which got everyone up and moving. The band really came through on that song and at times it felt like the walls were going to cave in because everyone was jumping and singing, so happy to be in the presence of such a verifiable musical genius.
I must admit that I was sad to see her leave. I was half-expecting her to come back on for an “Everything is Everything” encore. That song is one of my favorites of all time and I remember the video so vividly because it is one of the single most important videos in what has become my obsession with music. The video’s effects made me understand the power of “new media” and the song’s beat and content sparked a lifelong love of good hip-hop. However, before she ended the set, she did give us one perhaps equally comparable treat. She truthfully explained that she is making a comeback (and is playing enough shows to make me believe this) and had been recording recently. Whether or not her return to the game comes to light remains to be unseen, but I can tell you in full confidence that I will be first in line when and if the album drops.
