Philadelphia Weekly

According to the performer herself, Muhsinah’s name means, in a nutshell, charitable. But Muhsinah (or Muhsinah Abdul-Karim, or Muhsinah X, as she also likes to refer to herself) is a singer who’s more charitable with her music than her words. As in, she’s a gal of very few of the latter.

The 25-year-old former sound engineer from northeast D.C. is more straight and to-the-point than elaborate and long-winded.

You could also say this is Muhsinah once again reinforcing the enigmatic persona that has given her both a burgeoning fanbase and attention from the music media. She was named 2008’s Woman of the Year by music blog SoulBounce.com, which described her as “approachable yet complex.” Muhsinah believes that description’s a pretty fair assessment, though she claims she doesn’t intentionally go out of her way to create music that’s both celebratory and cerebral. “It’s definitely something that I don’t try my hardest to do,” she says over email.

While many in the press have compared her to fellow musical eccentric Georgia Anne Muldrow, her sound is also reminiscent of the psychedelic future-soul stylings of Sy Smith and Kissey Asplund, who are also free- spirited indie-R&B sirens. And although she’s cited Alice Coltrane and J Dilla as major influences, she says her inspirations can be as sensuous as they are musical. “I’m influenced by everything I hear and see,” she says. “It’s pretty subconscious.”

Coming from the same Beltway black-music movement as cats like Raheem DeVaughn (who she’s sung backup for), W. Ellington Felton, Kev Brown, Oddisee and others, Muhsinah has been out there performing for a while now. She dropped her first effort, The Oscillations EP, in 2005. In February of last year, she released her first full-length album, daybreak 2.0. Later that year, she rereleased it again online under the name The Oscillations: Sine, returning to the theme of her 2005 EP. “It’s a collection of music from 2003 to 2008,” she says. “I like to call it my ‘audition tape.’”

Muhsinah says she dropped her album again to get listeners prepared for part two in the Oscillations series, The Oscillations: Triangle. She says, “When I started the record I’m working on now, I wanted to release all of my older work, to clear the air and start fresh.” Set for release this month, she calls it her first true effort. And even though she’s already hit Interweb audiences with a couple of tracks from the album, she says even she doesn’t know where all this is leading. “I don’t know what you all should expect,” she admits. “But I’m really excited about it.”

Several major names are also excited about Muhsinah’s alternative talent, and they want her in their corner. When Phonte Coleman of the North Carolina hip-hop group Little Brother was looking for some female vocal accompaniment for the second Foreign Exchange album he was working on with producer Nicolay, he called on Muhsinah. “Phonte found me on MySpace randomly,” she remembers. “And he called me up. Out of the blue. We worked on [the music] from there.” One of the three tracks they performed on, “Daykeeper,” became the first single off the Exchange’s acclaimed Leave It All Behind.

Common also teamed up with her for “Changes,” a track off of his Universal Mind Control album. “The A&R at Geffen [Common’s label] is very supportive of my music and helped by passing my stuff along to Common,” she says. “I met him and we talked about moving forward. He’s a great person and I look forward to working with him in the future.”

But even with all these high-profile gigs she’s been accumulating, Muhsinah isn’t forgetting that she’s still a humble gal, providing enjoyable music for her audience. “I want them to have a blast,” she says. “Dance and sing with me. It’s music, folks. Enjoy yourselves.”

How very charitable.