Fiona Apple when accepting an award said:

"...everybody out there that's watching, everybody that's watching this world, this world is bullshit and you shouldn't model your life about what you think that we think is cool and what we're wearing and what we're saying and everything. Go with yourself...And it's just stupid that I'm in this world, but you're all very cool to me...."

and came off as being very fake. One single moment of redemption for a lifetime spent serving the devil of the music industry doesn't make you real. Telling us not to model our lives after the image she projects without changing her own image seems hypocritical.

Lauryn Hill, on the other hand, in her recent album "MTV Unplugged 2.0" tells it like it is. A lot of people would say this is a dangerous move. Career suicide to be sure.

Musically, this album is a little uneven. Her voice cracks, she's raspy, she flubs a few lines, she even cries.

Some newspaper reviewed this album and said that while she's asking for our sympathy, are we supposed to feel guilty for buying her album and building this cage for her, but the newspaper's got it all wrong. I'm not surprised, this is exactly what I just said about Fiona Apple. That reporter is probably so comfortable in the cage he's built for himself that he doesn't even recognize it as a cage.

"Stuck in a system that seems to suck your blood. Held emotionally hostage by what everybody does. Counting all the money that you give them just because. Exploiting ignorance in the name of love."

"Fantasy is what people want, but reality is what they need, and I've just retired from the fantasy part..."

Lauryn isn't placing any blame here. The life she lived was her own, she's not blaming anybody for it. She isn't saying her life is any better or worse than any of ours. She was just at a point in her life where she couldn't stand the cage anymore, and she broke out of it. Actually, I won't say that I'm not sure any of us are ever free from our cages. I think the Buddha would agree with me there.

What Lauryn is giving us, the message she wants us to take away is that the cage we build for ourselves is recognizable, and you can only work to change your circumstance if you recognize your circumstance to begin with.

I honestly don't believe you can escape the cage, but if you recognize the cage, you won't be as afraid of it. If you see the cracks in someone else's facade, you'll let yours down a little bit. If Lauryn can learn to recognize reality, so can I. It takes a lot of courage to do that. Reality is something we don't want to acknowledge. It's something that causes our fantasies, our beliefs, our notions of reality to crack.

The newspaper reporter didn't say how he thought the album would do. In this position you don't want to be wrong - if you're wrong often enough someone may take away your cage. I'm going to venture that it's going to do very well. This album stands in stark stark contrast to all of the fake and manufactured music out there.

One last story before I go.

The Buddha took on disciples in his later years. One day, Envy came to visit, and his followers all tried to push Envy away. Banish Envy. We don't want you around here. Envy made it past them, though, and made it to the place where the Buddha was meditating. His followers said "we tried to turn him away, but we couldn't." The Buddha, on the other hand, recognized Envy. "Ah, Envy," he said. "My old friend, come and sit for a while."

The world wants us to push our emotions away, deny them, only acknowledge the clean ones so they can use the dirty ones to make us do their bidding. We have to acknowledge our whole selves, the dirty bits we always forget to wash as well.

Spiritually, this album is very strong. Her voice cracks, she's raspy, she flubs a few lines, she even cries.

You have to understand, I like that kind of thing. Sure you could use a computer to fix pitch problems, and you could hide behind producers and millions of dollars of equipment, but music isn't about that. You can make music with robots and computers, but it's humans that enjoy music, why not let humans, with all their flaws, make music?

Music is something that should be in everybody's life, and the fact that most people believe music has to be perfect shows how far the money people want us to believe music is something that's done by paid professionals, by people we should pay to idolize. I have much respect for Lauryn for bringing music back to the people.

Thank you Lauryn for having the courage to make this album. It is one of the most musical, beautiful, spiritual, intense, lyrical, passionate albums I've ever heard.

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