Wais P — Chinchilla

Malcolm Byer has been on the circuit since at least 1996 as half of Da Ranjahz, Brooklyn-based hip-hop duo affiliated with Roc-A-Fella and who debuts as a guest spitting a few bars alongside Jay-Z in his "Vol. 2". Byer had debuted some month before as solo in the soundtrack of the movie "Street Is Watching", composed mainly by the Roc-A-Fella boys, participating in the final cut credited as Wais. Since 2000, his activity can be easily defined as inconstant: after trying to continue his career both with the duo and as a soloist, without success, he understands that he cannot break into rap and abandons the mic, participating in the albums of some friends until beginning of the 2010s, when, after taking part in the latest works of Ras Kass, he participates in various projects of the producer Statik Selektah and his affiliated rappers. In early 2020, almost 25 years after his debut, he comes out with his debut studio album, produced entirely by Statik.

The album has the contours of the EP, twenty-two minutes, eight tracks, four guests, one producer. These twenty minutes hold up to the rhythms of Statik and his friends (Haile Supreme, Term, Nems and Paul Wall), because Wais P holds up the entire project on the theme of pimpin' so dear to Too $hort, a topic on which he based his entire career and his entire life. He's not the best spitting period of the time, nonetheless, I don't feel like discrediting his rapping style: he seems very average to me personally, but his syncopated and slow delivery style is decent. Lyricism is forced into braggadocio and misogyny pretty much every single bar, but that can be easily ignored if you pay attention to the rhythms of Statik Selektah.

The beatmaker from Lawrence, Massachusetts, hasn't had a lean year, although I think 2019 has been a better season than this for him and one of his best years ever, it will be hard to match. Here, he does a nice job to lift this tape up to sufficiency: his jazzy boom bap is enjoyable and suited to Wais P's style, he doesn't miss the samples and the drum machines, slow and pounding in most cases. Some cuts suffer the absence of guests or the excessive presence on the mic of Wais P. Statik miss a single beat choosing a random squeaky synths for the background of a simplistic jazzy boom bap for "R.n.L". Yes, even beyond two minutes is excessive, in fact "Walk On" is his best cut, boasting a nice sample from the classic "Walk on By", which isn't exactly that of Dionne Warwick, or that of Isaac Hayes or the hidden one by Cal Tjader wisely used by Premier for the Gang Starr classic "Full Clip", it's a obscure cover that I haven't found yet after listening to dozens of them.

Either way, Statik cleans up the sound so it's crisp and clean, bright, nice job. The presence of other performers allows to bear more Wais P: Haile Supreme makes a good soul hook rnb for the first song, Termanology worthily delivers above a splendid jazzy rhythm with slow drum and soulful female sample looped in the background and Nems does his homework on a rhythm similar to that of "So Easy". Paul Wall surprises positively and I'd like to say his track is the best, with a skeletal boom bap, very slow drum and good male soul sample.

Overall, acceptable EP, recommended for the fans of Statik and of his inner circle, for the rest of the listeners it's not an essential record. 6/10.