To those who think the generation that came of age in the 1980s lacks focus, here's one bit of advice...take a pill--a Jagged Little Pill! Although she only recently passed her 20th birthday, Alanis Morissette's Maverick debut proves she possesses a wealth of insight and an off-kilter sense of humor that's at once untainted and mature.

"People have always said I was an old soul," says Alanis. "They said I was always a little more intense and introspective than everyone was used to seeing girls be, so they didn't know where to categorize me." It all boils down to this one fact: "I want to walk though life instead of being dragged through it."

That's a pretty accurate description of the jarringly honest, frequently provocative songs on Jagged Little Pill, Alanis' Maverick debut. The native of Ottawa, Canada uses her own experiences--from a Catholic school upbringing, to her many travels through Europe as a youth, to her years as a teenager living alone in Toronto--as a springboard for some striking, universal statements. In the incisive "All I Really Want" (on which her self-aware observations are set against a swirling psychedelic canvas), Alanis pleads for fulfillment of needs both physical and psychic, while the stirring "Not The Doctor" offers a steely-eyed declaration of emotional independence.

"Most of the songs are, in a roundabout way, actually addressed to myself; there's a certain aspect of the songs that's very confessional, very unadulterated," she allows. "I wrote some of the songs and woke up the next day not even remembering I'd done them--almost like a stream-of-consciousness. It was a very unfettered, spiritual experience."