Review: Music Muldrow's electronica warms the Art Garage

Free-form crooner Georgia Anne Muldrow is a practiced hand. The California native, specializing in spacey electronica, has been making records since 2006 under her own name, in collaboration with hip-hop artists Sa-Ra and J*DaVeY. She's also long partnered with rapper Dudley Perkins (a.k.a. Declaime) as G&D (they're also handsome life partners).

With her new Stones Throw album Seeds, Muldrow makes her best artistic gesture, with bold, existential riffs on community (universal and personal), motherhood, divinity, and love. Along with her jazzy vocals and the sympathetic production of experimental hip-hop giant Madlib, Seeds makes Muldrow a true force - an electronic Nina Simone touched by the odd beauty of Erykah Badu.

An enthusiastic crowd filled the Arts Garage for Muldrow and company's post-midnight performance Wednesday. The audience sat on stage within feet of the orange-clad Muldrow, who treated her fans with warm camaraderie. She joked about buying hair grease and shades from the Arts Garage's in-house vendor, and offered the stage to her rapping "Philadelphia cousin" Hezekiah and her partner Declaime before going it alone.

The duets with Declaime were warmly weird, with Parliament Funkadelic-inspired cuts such as "Mothership" and the airily soulful "Flowers." With her high coo and his wiry baritone raps, they provoked and romanced each other in delicious teamwork. Muldrow slipped into her solo set as if dipping slowly into a warm bath. To the electro-ambient melodies and rubbery beats of DJ Romes, she waltzed through the avant-R&B of "The Birth of Petey Wheatstraw." She leaped subtly through the rough honk of "Roses" and the rolling psychedelia of "Calabash." "Are you really here for the Holy Spirit?" she howled before launching into the ticklish "Husfriend." "Everything I want is here," she intoned happily, her hands stretched into the crowd. I'm certain they felt the same about her.