Seeds

On Seeds, Georgia Muldrow takes a step back and leaves the beatmaking to Otis Jackson Jr., aka Madlib. As producers, Muldrow and Jackson are not worlds apart, so the switch requires no adjustment on the part of the listener. That said, this is one dense and tight set, barely over half-an-hour in length, and it's definitely in contention for Muldrow's most focused, funkiest, and (somewhat ironically) personal release to date. While she does not stray into new topics, there is an emphasis on her family as salvation and purpose, and all children — seeds, as in the chilling call-to-action title song — are a major concern. The most direct track of the lot is "Husfriend," where she honors her relationship with Dudley Perkins (aka Declaime, who shows up elsewhere): "I'm so glad I had your child/Ecstatic that we really followed through"; "You're the only one that made my demons leave the room." Muldrow can't quite divorce the planetary and personal issues, heard vividly on "Best Love," which sounds just like a simple, sweet, straight-ahead love song until she starts asking her other half for money to build water wells on three continents ("We can make a difference if we try now"). Jackson's productions trawl through more piles of the obscure jazz and funk recordings at his disposal, and they foster typically high-viscosity rhythms, capable of pulling some neck muscles.