In the Key of Collaboration

In September of 2018, Muhammad Austin was ready to make a big move.

Better known by his stage name, Mvstermind, the celebrated St. Louis producer, hip-hop artist, and songwriter was all set to officially decamp across the country to Los Angeles in pursuit of greater professional success in the music industry. He and his now-wife, Savis Davis Austin, had sold all of their things in preparation for a life on the West Coast, even going so far as to elope there — his marriage certificate says Los Angeles on it, he notes.

As it turns out, though, life had one more major development in store for him. “We got welcomed with the news that we had a little baby boy on the way,” he explains.

The impending arrival of his son, Moon, changed the couple’s plans in an instant. Knowing they had a family support system back home that could help them raise their son, they made the decision to stay in the Gateway City. But that wasn’t about to stop the ambitious artist from chasing his dreams.

“How do we want to pursue those dreams?” he recalls wondering. “How do we want to do those things and also cultivate family, and cultivate a community?”

Moon is now 5 years old, and in the years since he came into the world, Mvstermind, 33, has worked hard to build up that community in St. Louis in a way that helps uplift other artists as well.

In 2020, in partnership with event producer Bryant Powell, he set to work building out The Gem, a studio space and artist incubator hub in south city that regularly hosts artists from across the metro. The Gem also now hosts weekly Open Aux nights, inviting local artists to share and draw feedback on their recent work, whether that be a demo they recorded in their car or some new lyrics they’re still developing. In 2022, he launched his Mvstercamp artist incubator initiative, working with the Regional Arts Commission and Music at the Intersection to help artists get more opportunities and financial support to push their music forward while simultaneously teaching them how to properly move through the music industry.

That same year, he marched into St. Louis CITY SC’s offices and talked them into taking him on as the team’s Director of Musical Experience, a position he came up with himself that was based on rapper Big Sean’s position with the Detroit Pistons — he served in that role until early this year. And all the while, he’s kept up his profile outside the St. Louis area as well, even performing at South by Southwest (SXSW) in 2023.

He credits the city that raised him with the success he’s seen since he chose to stay.

“It’s been a community hand-in-hand process throughout this whole entire time that also gave me a newfound love for St. Louis that I didn’t know I possessed,” Mvstermind muses. “It’s a real, true love that I have for this place.”

Mvstermind got his start writing music as a teenager and, in the years since, he’s logged thousands of miles on the road, performing at such major festivals as A3C, SXSW, and St. Louis’ own Music at the Intersection. He’s shared the stage with some of the greats, including Travis Scott, Busta Rhymes, Chance the Rapper, and his favorite artist, Lupe Fiasco, and has cemented himself as a St. Louis tastemaker. 

“I think being in St. Louis is that reminder that we’re smack dab in the middle of the United States, it’s very accessible for you to hit the road and go travel, and push what you preach,” he says. “Throughout the years, that really just got stamped in our philosophy: ‘Go travel. Go see the world. Bring it back. Go experience the world, and carry that same St. Louis energy with you whenever you do.’” 

When he set out to help build up the artistic community in St. Louis through the Mvstercamp program, he knew that imparting the wisdom he’s gained from his time in the industry would be an important element.

“This is a labor of love, man,” he says. “Just being a St. Louis musician, everything that I can stand on inside of this city is literally from the backs of my peers, the backs of the community. So it was only natural that I felt compelled to just break down and give back.”

To that end, Mvstercamp serves as a free annual six-day bootcamp that helps musicians tighten up their game. Among the things that it imparts to participants are how to soundcheck and prepare for a live show, tips on strength and stamina from a personal trainer to help reduce fatigue on stage, guerrilla marketing ideas, and more. Through its partnership with the Regional Arts Commission, it also helps artists get access to grants and funding. Since getting its start in 2022, Mvstercamp has worked with some 95 artists, helping them acquire more than $110,000 in funding. 

Mvstermind and his team put out a public call each year for musicians to participate. Most of those who apply are from the St. Louis area, but they’ve also seen some more far-flung participants as well.

“We have folks coming here from L.A., from Texas, from New York, from Kansas City,” he explains. “(We’re) centering people straight to the Gateway to know that this is a hub for community, for resources.”

Each year the program accepts a total of 45 artists. Mvstercamp is not restricted to any one genre, and a wide variety of sounds are welcomed. Gathering dozens of ambitious artists together in one room in itself creates plenty of opportunities for collaboration, which Mvstermind says has proven fruitful for all parties involved.

“I think some of the most beautiful parts about it is that the 45 artists, they begin to create agency for themselves,” he explains. “So they’ve already been touring with one another. They’ve been show-swapping with one another, they’ve been doing music with one another, and you’re watching the movements take place in front of your eyes. And in many instances, it’s just the fact that Mvstercamp served as a facilitator and a place for them to meet and grow with one another.”

A partnership with Music at the Intersection has seen Mvstercamp running its own dedicated stage each year, with many artists who’ve participated in the program being tapped to perform. One such artist is St. Louis singer-songwriter Alexia Simone, who played the festival in both 2023, the same year she went through the program, and again in 2024. Simone grew up singing at Mount Zion Missionary Baptist Church in Richmond Heights. She says the program was a confidence booster for her, one that made her feel more comfortable performing her own R&B music in front of a crowd.

“Growing up in church, it was very normal for me to get up and sing in front of a lot of people,” she explains. “(But) when it came time to perform my own music, I was completely terrified, and I just felt that I needed a bit of a push, or just an opportunity and a space to hone in and really refine my feelings, my performance, and how I want to approach it.”

Being surrounded by similarly-minded artists in a professional setting whose entire purpose is to make each other better at what they do was inspiring, Simone says, and helped her get over her initial trepidation.

“Having other artists that you can look to and watch and be inspired by, collaborate with, and learn with, you realize that you’re not alone, and that we’re all here for the same purpose,” she says. “And you know, iron sharpens iron.”

Fellow singer-songwriter Aida Ade is another of the artists that went through Mvstercamp in 2023 before performing at Music at the Intersection this year. Her musical roots run deep as well; she’d spent her early years being classically trained on the violin and viola, and even made some appearances at Powell Hall and with the Alton Symphony Orchestra and the Alton Youth Symphony. In December 2016, she made the decision to pursue vocal music, and she wound up making her live vocal debut in May 2017. A string of well-received EPs followed, but a family tragedy put a halt to that momentum.

“I stopped doing music after the death of my aunt,” Ade explains. “It just kind of didn’t feel right anymore. I was just grieving; it was a very complicated grief thing going on.”

But then, in 2023, Mvstermind reached out.

“Out of nowhere, Mvstermind wrote me, and he was like, ‘Hey, this year we’re doing the second year of Mvstercamp — you should totally do it,’” Ade says. “I was like, ‘Oh man, I really don’t do music anymore.’ He’s like, ‘Bro, just apply. Come on. Just do it. Just do it.’ So I just went and applied and the rest is history.”

As an experienced musician, Ade found the networking opportunities that Mvstercamp afforded her, through the community that the program intentionally fosters, to be of the most value. They helped inspire her to get back to performing her own music, she says, and the connections she made with them opened up a world of creative opportunities she would not have had otherwise.

“Seeing people from all kinds of different walks of life and backgrounds who are so dedicated to their music, honestly, it was more inspiring than anything,” Ade says. “And then on top of that, the artists that I’ve met, they’re some of the ones who have put me on to different opportunities and performance opportunities. I’ve gotten to feature on different artists, and I’ve gotten to work with them in different capacities, including even photographers and videographers, producers, engineers. It really has just kind of opened up the world of St. Louis music especially for me.”

Since making the decision to stay in his hometown, that’s exactly what Mvstermind has worked to achieve: Opening up the world of St. Louis music for everyone. While it might not have been his first plan, it’s proven to have been a very good one — so much so that he no longer spends his time California dreaming. He now has bigger plans for the future of the St. Louis music scene, and the city is better for it.

“I’m on a particular mission right now,” he explains. “It’s an extended side mission that I’m listening to my soul to do. … Right now my soul is saying, ‘Nah, I’m staying. Let’s tend to this.’”