Attitude: A Hip Hop Rapsody (1990)

No misspellings in Attitude: A Hip Hop Rapsody. This album is truly a ''rapsody'' — gritty, soulful, butt- burning, confrontational, contagious. Queens-bred Shazzy, 21, is one of the most eloquent women in rap. She's sassy like Salt-n-Pepa, raw like MC Lyte, graceful like Queen Latifah. And the background music is as fluid as her rhymes — pounding beats, deep bass, gyrating rhythms, smoky piano licks, and some unusual sampling (from old radio clips to Donovan). Shazzy may rap as fast and furiously as hip-hop pro Rakim, of the hard-hitting duo Eric B. & Rakim, but she has more compassion for her victims. In ''Heartbreaker'' she even gets down on herself for playing the tease — she doesn't boast about her conquests. And for all the male rappers who call women ''bitches'' and ''hoes,'' she's coined quite a term — ''Giggahoe'' (a play on ''gigolo'') — that turns out to be one of the album's best tracks. In ''Giggahoe,'' Shazzy raps, ''I ain't livin' like a low-budget lookalike/I got too much love to give that's just too hype.'' Never mind that she comes from the mean streets; Shazzy believes in love and in herself. A-