Ani DiFranco-Educated Guess

Ani DiFranco has been "on her own" — to quote her company's phone number-for a long time. But not since the release of her second album back in 1991 has she been quite as much a solo act as she is on Educated Guess. On it, Ani not only plays all the instruments and provides the lead and backing vocals, but for the first time in her career she singlehandedly did all the recording and mixing, and stuffed the discs into the jewel cases as well. We're joking about that last part, but the rest is no exaggeration. If it weren't for Greg Calbi (who mastered the album, as he has done with almost all of Ani's recordings for the last decade), the folks who usually proofread liner notes at Righteous Babe would have to take the month off. Educated Guess is truly a singular sensation. Its contents are pretty singular, too. On songs like "Bubble" and "Swim," the first-person narrator revisits past loves and reflects on the lessons learned from them. Elsewhere, particularly on the spoken-word track