Bubbling Under the 75 Best Albums of 2011: Lalah Hathaway

Artist: Lalah Hathaway

Album: Where It All Begins

Label: Stax/Concord

US Release Date: 2011-10-18

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Lalah Hathaway
Where It All Begins

A journey of musical greatness begins here. The 12 songs on Where It All Begins represent a new benchmark in Lalah Hathaway’s two-decade career, reflecting the singer’s impressive stylistic range. Hathaway satisfies many appetites on the album yet there’s a continuity between each song. The acoustic-pop orientation of “Wrong Way” — four minutes of absolute perfection — yields to Hathaway’s well-conceived cover of “You Were Meant For Me”, the last solo single her father Donny Hathaway released before his untimely passing. The contagious bounce of “If You Want To” increases the club quotient while “Always Love You” provides a cool-down. Hathaway’s voice sets “Lie to Me” afire above a jagged rhythm and sweetens the melody on the lullaby-like “Dreamland”. Amidst artists that are chasing the next-big-producer or trend, Lalah Hathaway is just doing what feels right and, in the process, raising the standard for our expectations.