Conductor Williams Produces REi the Imperial’s Best EP “Operation: Flamethrower” (EP Review)
This is the 4th EP from New Orleans, Louisiana emcee REi the Imperial. Known for his vibrant storytelling & witty lyrics, he emerged in 2009 off his debut mixtape Spaceships & Satellites followed by another tape Worst Rapper Alive & the full-length debut Rise of the Rejects roughly 8 years later. He has since followed this up with the sophomore effort Origins, his 3rd album Respect How I’m Comin’ & his first 3 EPs 1-833-DOWNBAD as well as Worst Rapper Alive 1.5 & Worst Rapper Alive 2. It’s only been 16 months since the latter & Conductor Williams is being brought in to produce Operation: Flamethrower to high anticipation.
After the “Mission Briefing” intro, the first song “Spirit of Excellence” is a psychedelically drumless opener reflecting on success going from around the corner to his pores whereas “Title Shot” soulfully talks about how you gotta keep going since you’re gonna look up & be up one day. “Panduricane” cloudily suggests Pootie Tang should be the CNN correspondent to the pandemic/hurricane mixture leading into “Imperial vs. Bowser” dustily referencing the Endeavor-owned TKO Group Holdings division WWE’s longest running flagship program Monday Night RAW on USA Network moving to Netflix in a few months alongside former ECW World Television Champion, 3-time WWE Tag Team Champion, 3-time WWE Cruiserweight Champion, WWE United States Champion, CZW World Heavyweight Champion, 2-time BJWジュニアヘビー級王座, 2-time BJW認定タッグ王座 & CMLL MundialPeso Semicompleto Campeon 田尻.
“Thelma Evans” chops up the soul samples again paying tribute to his romantic interest while “Baby Charmander” takes the uncanny boom bap route instrumentally likening himself to a younger version of the titular Pokémon. “Jessica Rabbit” jazzily tells her he doesn’t wanna play her since family comes first while “Sunzilla” hooks up a grungy rock flip getting hardcore lyrically. “Auntie Rita” featuring LG & Old Orleans ends the EP with the trio over a soulful beat talking love again.
I vividly remember this guy contacting me several years ago on Instagram & fast forward present day, he just put out the best EP of his entire career. Conductor Williams’ production is incredibly consistent top to bottom & noticeably stronger than the instrumentals on REi’s previous work, paving the way for the Reject Society leader to take his storytelling & witty bars to newer levels beyond.
Score: 9/10
