Georgia Anne Muldrow - A Thoughtiverse Unmarred (2015)

Georgia Anne Muldrow is a seeker and truth-teller. The words on her first rap album--produced entirely by Chris Keys--balance a beautiful delivery with brutal honesty. These are the honest confessions of a mother who refuses to turn a blind eye to immediate and ancestral misdeeds. Her rhymes are conscious, but more importantly, they speak to our deeper conscience. The prophetic soul artist offers a singlular voice, you can hear the echoes of past oracles: Billie Holiday, Alice Coltrane, Erykah Badu, and Lauryn Hill. But the wisom and narrative reflect Muldrow's most personal revelations. From the album's inception, we find her analyzing the patterns of her life in the constellations, rambling down dusty trails, pledging to jot down these crystalline thoughts in her mind as a north star for the misguided youth. She holds her head high, not in the vein of superiority, but as someone who ''used to roam wild on a one-way street.'' The evils of the world are given no quarter. She indicts corporate thugs and war mongers, the shamelessly materialistic and musicians who refuse to offer a modicum of substance. Her motivation isn't to brow beat, but to challenge you to do beter--it's the type of record that can trigger resolutions on any day of the year. It's a document of racial solidarity and pride, but one that offers an olive branch to anyone down for the cause. The beats are dusty and suffused with warmth so overwhelming it practically radiates Vitamin D. The gritty drums and hypnotic loops are minimal enough to let Muldrow's mineral-rich voice fill in the gaps. There's a timelessness in its questioning of age-old human problems, yet it tailors the inquiries towards the a diurnal basis. Muldrow uses music as a vessel to inspire hope and propel people towards a better future. Beyond identifying worldly inequities, this record details one woman's quest to improve things for herself, her children and everyone else. It's about finding universal truths, while straying true to one's essence--transcending the hate and slowly staring to heal.

''This is an artist whose spirit of independence has scattered her presence over as many contexts as her psychedelic, jazz-inflected neo-soul sensibility can carry her.'' --Pitchfork

''Music is in the blood for singer-songwriter Georgia Anne Muldrow.'' --Rolling Stone