Artist: Roman Flowrs

Artist: Roman Flowrs

Links: https://www.facebook.com/RomanFlowrs

http://romanflowrs.com/

To my thinking, all “Peso” needed to launch a six-million-dollar Mob was its lovingly woozy hooks (Ty Beats) and A$AP Rocky's one astonishing rhyme, “Couple A, B, C's, bad bitch double D's / Popping E, I don't give a F, told you I'm a G” (well, those things, and the viral video). My point though, is that if you put aside Rocky's subsequent fame, which elevated him to larger-than-life status, most pre-deal rappers don't, as A$AP claimed, import cocaine [importation, as distinct from dealing] or rock the Raf Simons menswear [a $620 scarf, anyone?]. Artists can sing/rap about anything they want, but we don't gotta believe it. It's just too easy to make shit up. [As an aside, hip-hoppers' claims to both the high life and treason-level crime have become the rap game's penny: functional (fitting rhyme schemes), commonly accepted (an artist who's fronting won't call out another pretender), and relatively worthless.]

So it's the promising start that has a rapper like Roman Flowrs opening his debut LP, #OneHellOfAPromo, with a conversation with his grandma (“Hello Tomorrow”). It sets the tone that this positive influence is cool with Roman keeping long hours, as long as they're spent with his musical pursuits (as opposed to something less productive). The song's hook also hints at the album's potential, boasting well-positioned bass and [auto-tuned] background vocals, e.g. at 1:09.

The track to follow, “Lake Shore Drive,” is even better, beginning with a suite of horns (Nico Segal) on what may be #OneHellOfAPromo's standout track. (Heck, it even alludes to Destiny's Child early hit, “No No No (Part 2)”!) Built on quality sing-rapping in the same way Kendrick Lamar's “Swimming Pools (Drank)” was [but with a voice akin to Big Sean's], the rhymes are among the best on the album. This is partly due to the fact that the lyrical portraits are rooted in a Chicago experience that comes across as credible.

That is, rather than being all Maybachs and capo-level crime, it's cruising Lake Shore Drive, appreciating women (“I like model chicks, but 'hood bitches' ass is meaner,” with one such chick/bitch offering, “I know you got a girl, so I don't mind being your number two”), weekend-tripping to Lake Michigan (“I was so young, I thought it was the sea”), albeit with some crime in the neighborhood, e.g. “Where I'm from, being 21 is like an urban myth”; “They robbing Santa Claus before he drops off any gifts”; “Where I'm from, the dope boys is the rock stars / But they can't cop cars without seeing cop cars.”

#OneHellOfAPromo makes for an enriching listen with musical flourishes (mostly in introduction): the funky bass of “Roun Town'” (at :03), the fascinating round of vocals on “Local $elebrity” (at :12), the sumptuous keyboard arrangement of “Into the Light” (:00-:37), and some nice guest vocals by Thomas DaVinci (“Hello Tomorrow,” “Into the Light,” and “No More”).

But it's the skit of “Flex Season II” (at 2:02) that's perhaps the finest example of a right way to do things at the “Peso” point of a rap career – that is, before the six million hits the bank account. The humorous bit has a player defending himself: “[Paraphrasing] It's not like I had to try: I pulled your girl with a six-piece! So start getting money; that way your girls won't go hungry and get disloyal.”

The sketch would be less notable if the rap industry wasn't so obsessed with the high/low mixture of riches and crime. As it is, the skit reminds that even in street-oriented rap, there are other things to talk about [think: Kanye's “The New Workout Plan”]. And it's the original voices like Roman Flowrs' that are best positioned to end up on lists of legends like that of “All for You” (at 3:24), i.e. Kanye West, Lauryn Hill, Jimi Hendrix, and Marvin Gaye.

*** The author of this review, Phillip Bryant, plays the maktoum for the following band: http://youtu.be/tMS73-1kCr8