Vanessa Paradis
Released
Prince protégés are legion, thanks to all the music he heard in his head during his lifetime. By contrast, Lenny Kravitz has written and produced only two outside projects to date: Cree Summer’s Street Faërie (1999), and this early ’90s treasure from his then-girlfriend. Paradis, 19, was already famous in France for her childhood hit “Joe le Taxi,” some films, and a Serge Gainsbourg-produced album. Full of pop (“Sunday Mondays” recalls the Sesame Street theme), rock (a Velvet Underground cover, “I’m Waiting for the Man”) and Motown-ish soul (“Be My Baby”), Vanessa Paradis is an unsung surprise.