Ms Lauryn Hill’s Perth show on Tuesday night was a hot mess. Taking to the stage at HBF Stadium a tick before 10pm, an already restless crowd was just happy she showed at all. Hill has a reputation for testing the loyalty of her fans by being notoriously late to start her shows, or by not showing up at all. But here she was at last. “Are you ready?” she asked.

We were. Just not for what she delivered. Lost Ones got the ball rolling and showed Hill has still got the goods in the rap department. But early sound issues which would plague the whole show sounded an early warning, with follow-ups Everything is Everything and When It Hurts So Bad barely recognisable from their studio recordings. Final Hour showed some promise with the anthemic “you can keep the money, you can keep the power” prompting crowd chants and a glimpse of the passion and righteousness synonymous with Hill’s back catalogue. A backdrop of footage featuring police brutality and race riots accompanied Forgive Them Father and was a welcome distraction from the increasingly distracted Hill who appeared to frequently be struggling with a troublesome earpiece.

“I grew up with a beautiful legacy of classic music,” she told the crowd during a rare moment of audience engagement. “At the same time I had the streets and hip hop music in my other ear.” Miseducation fans are well versed in Hill’s legacy of splicing the old with the new and the resulting melange which brought doo-wop and old-school soul to a whole new generation in the early 90s. But with every little nuance stripped from her inimitable reimagining of Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You, we were left wanting. The soaring, joyful vocals of To Zion were nowhere to be heard, with Hill barely able to finish a verse in the breathless rendition which, once again, had been divested of any of its original magic.

That Thing and Killing Me Softly continued the evening’s trend of epic mutilation of the songs we’d come out in droves on a school night to hear. Opening act Nas got the crowd pumping with his old-school hip-hop ringing true. Credit:Travis Hayto. It was so very disappointing. Hill can still spit rhymes with the best of them, no question. But her vocals, once a powerhouse of passion dripping with - warranted - self-righteous rage and indignation - and always drawn from a base of love and humanity - were sorely lacking.

Hill’s set was in stark contrast to opening act Nas, who proved 20 years was no match for his raw talent. He was sublime. Maybe Hill was having an off night. Maybe sound issues threw her off what could have been a jubilant celebration of an album so good she’s been dining out on it for two decades. But maybe the hordes of people leaving early means this is as good as it gets for her fans in a live arena.