After years on her grind and three releases to her credit, retired chemist Cristalle Bowen captured a lot of attention in 2006. It was recorded under her alias Psalm One in 2006 for her album, The Death of the Frequent Flyer, and released on Rhymesayers. The full-length introduced the Chicago-based MC’s swagger and formidable rhyming skills to a larger audience and made an invaluable contribution to the relative dearth of female artists in underground hip hop. She is working on a proper follow-up to Frequent Flyer, which Rhymesayers is expected to drop next year. In the mean time, Psalm is constantly tweeting and putting together a series of compilations under the title Woman @ Work that are available for free download on her Web site.

The first installment came out in June and serves as a great reintroduction to Psalm’s charismatic style. Her swagger is especially evident on “Baking Soda,” “Morning,” closer “My Bucket List,” which doubles as a tribute to her hometown, and opener “Better Than My Last (Dirty),” where she states that new shoes are required when making a comeback. “Better Than My Last” also has an empowering groove, foregrounded by lines like “Daddy pimped a girl, I can’t be a whore/So you know I’m fixin’ that more and more and more,” averring that Psalm is predisposed to playerism, but is struggling against it.

“Open for Business” may be my favorite track. It builds a groove around two improbable elements – a swirling acoustic guitar figure and plinky keyboard – as heavy bass and Psalm’s flow play double dutch. I also love the moment in “It’s Worth It” where Psalm proclaims that she shines through the dark like an ester solvent, which she then drops chemistry background to explain their application in glow sticks. These songs are punctuated by sassy invocations of the album’s title and seemingly random snippets from movies like Secretary that help unify the series’ them, which don’t necessarily speak to the Volume 1’s artistic merit, but gives the listener a sense of the rapper’s wry employment of free association.

Speaking of sampled dialogue, an exchange between Clueless’s stoner couple Tai and Travis introduces “Stuff (with Abe Lincoln),” a track that gave me considerable pause. It’s the most sexually explicit song on the album, with Psalm breathlessly requesting multiple male and female partners for kinky exploration. My discomfort probably stemmed from liberal white guilt and concern over perpetuating racist assumptions around black women’s hypersexuality. While I applaud Psalm intimating about past insecurities with lines about being “worried ‘bout this chunky” and reclaiming her body and personal autonomy, several other lyrics bothered me. There’s the icky musing “maybe I’m a player, I learned it from my daddy” and the regrettable come-on “you’re so beautiful my privates ‘bout to tear up.” But the chorus gave me the most trouble, as it ends with the line “call me Abe Lincoln, I want my slaves pleased.”

This isn’t to discredit the song itself; rather, I think Psalm is tapping into cultural assumptions, and metaphorical language that makes others, perhaps especially white feminists, uncomfortable.

The f-word is an important one to think about in relation to Psalm. While I’ve received no confirmation on how Psalm identifies and don’t want to misspeak out of recognition for many women of color’s fraught relationship with the term, she’s often associated with feminism. She has championed other female rappers while problematizing the term. Younger rapper Fluffy guests on “Baking Soda,” whose smooth flow belies her pronouncements of a “piranha cuddly” demeanor and a better jewelry collection than you possess.

That said, I like Volume 1 a great deal. It’s a fun, catchy record teeming with hooks and singular performances from Psalm. If her lyrics occasionally give me pause, it’s usually because she’s making me think. And if they make me want to start a debate with Psalm, I know I’m engaging with a smart woman who is working on it.