Familiar
Producer: Preme
Additional vocals: N/A
BPM: 60
[1]
This one for the niggas,
the ones that was called that descriptor
when they was delivered
out there in Virginia,
the ones ever since who have taken the care to defend the
people surrendered from coast to the coast to the cold and the whip of the lash,
I never lived it, but I’ll tell now…
boy it’s familiar.
Said, boy, it’s familiar.
For the gangs with the chains on they hands and they ankles it ain’t just a sankofa song.
For the Kings, whether Martin or Rodney, who knew it unlikely but asked could we all get along!
For the answer we know to that question that keep us a little suspicious,
We ain’t the first that have wished it.
We ain’t the first ones to get it.
Said, boy, it’s familiar.
For the mothers, the daughters, the sisters
who don’t get attention but often are victims,
so they suffer in silence from all kinds of violence
and try as they might we don’t listen.
For the beatings, the treatment, the rapings, the hangings and lynchings,
I hope that we can be forgiven.
I never lived it, but boy, it’s familiar.
Say, boy, it’s familiar.
All black on my windows,
pistol under my pillow,
if I’m an activist, I’m no pacifist.
I’m just keeping shit real, though.
I ain’t turning a blind eye,
and I ain’t expecting no heroes.
I ain’t pressing no 911,
but I ain’t living in fear, though.
[Hook]
Now what?
The same shit. The same shit.
Now what?
The same shit. The same shit.
Now what?
The same shit. The same shit.
Now what? The same shit.
Now what? The same shit.
Boy, it’s familiar,
mess with them boys, and they kill you,
then get a lawyer to deal with
annoying appeals to
the public to show ‘em they did ‘em
a favor destroying a villain.
No, you ain’t living
if you know you ain’t living
but seconds away from a sentence,
making a way for a system.
You die or they take you to prison.
Take what they know you ain’t giving.
[2]
This one for the niggas
who just got from prison,
or on they way, stuck on the ave.
Hustle from morning to evening for things that they need
or the things they can have.
City’s so cold, that you gotta fend for yourself, they compare it to Iraq,
‘cause it’s a war that we live in.
Imagine the war when our children say “Boy, it’s familiar.”
For the gangs and the fame
and the whips and the chains
and the game that we play through the pain
that we drench ourselves in when we win
since we win at the game then it seems we should call it champ pain.
Elevated—we taking the L but we winning,
‘cause we still living.
Living through pain, but we living.
Giving through strain, but we giving.
Boy, it’s familiar.
For the mothers, the daughters, the sisters
we don’t give attention but often are victims,
We inflict them with violence
and tell them to suffer in silence, so why would we listen?
For the beatings, the treatment, the rapings, the hangings and lynchings,
I hope we can be forgiven.
I hope we can be forgiven.
Boy, it’s familiar.
All black on my windows,
pistol under my pillow,
if I’m an activist, I’m no pacifist.
I’m just keeping shit real, though.
I ain’t turning a blind eye,
and I ain’t expecting no heroes.
I ain’t pressing no 911,
but I ain’t living in fear, though.
[Hook]
Now what?
The same shit. The same shit.
Now what?
The same shit. The same shit.
Now what?
The same shit. The same shit.
Now what? The same shit.
Now what? The same shit.
Boy, it’s familiar,
mess with them boys, and they kill you,
then get a lawyer to deal with
annoying appeals to
the public to show ‘em they did ‘em
a favor destroying a villain.
No, you ain’t living
if you know you ain’t living
but seconds away from a sentence,
making a way for a system.
You die or they take you to prison.
Take what they know you ain’t giving.
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8K6ooond-e8
Message
Producer: Truth
Additional vocals: N/A
BPM: 82.5
[1]
I’m still standing where the terror lives
Swear that I don’t wanna sleep but taking sedatives
for the pain.
And they keep blaming me for being hurt, needing work, seeing certain defeat.
In the mirror I see me,
and it’s clear what reap we sowing over and over
goals of a soldier—just tryna live. Look over our shoulders.
Just hoping that knowing better, expecting fire to come,
and still they ask, “If he wasn’t guilty, why did he run?”
For one, I’m guilty of being black as the night.
And two, I’m too aware of your fear of it. Fight or flight.
The righter right, in the brightest light, ain’t gone try to write my type of sight as the kind of plight that’ll spark the dynamite to make the world see
me as a human being. Sure as breathing leads to dying,
you and me ain’t seeing I the same. I done claimed victory before.
It’s the history of my fore-
fathers and you ain’t ‘bout be bothered to try to learn it.
[Hook]
If it’s all about these words I write,
then I hope that you receive ‘em
and more that you can believe ‘em.
It seems nobody wants that….
They telling me back then it was bad to have black skin.
I’m paying the cost now,
and saying we lost how
we can make what little we have into something better.
I think it’s all in the…
[2]
As sure as property costs and I gotta turn what I know into real estate,
when the realest state of reality bites
and the dealer takes from the pot before the card’s even dealt,
there’s other things on my mind that I’m more concerned with.
Not what Momma taught—The Golden Rule—
“Do unto who…what was done to you.” This shit’ll be burning now.
But the schools want me to think that I’m doomed—but I ain’t going.
I’m living and trying to get it. I’m s’posed to be learning how.
And they just teaching me to hate myself,
‘bout chains that I’m s’posed to break myself,
that ‘justice’ means “wait for help”
that ‘good life’ means “take for self.”
I’m busy redefining ‘great’ for self.
So when you hear me say “word to words.” just know the purpose behind it.
You see my work is defining me for myself.
I still stand where the terror lives
and they keep telling me to take but instead I give…my word.
[Hook]
If it’s all about these words I write,
then I hope that you receive ‘em
and more that you can believe ‘em.
It seems nobody wants that….
They telling me back then it was bad to have black skin.
I’m paying the cost now,
and saying we lost how
we can make what little we have into something better.
I think it’s all in the…
Sick
Producer: Truth
Additional vocals: Truth, Dead Prez
BPM: 90
[1]
From shorties to early 40s
we all wanna be Barry Gordys with different stories.
Nature naughty, never relate it to being taught we
can never make it unless we take it into the courts. See,
while you thinking it’s getting better,
I’m sitting, sketching letters and thinking of Medger Evers,
knowing I could never let us forget that it’s just alleged….
That freedom and the peace that you speak of is just a brief moment in history we
cannot see,
but we seek—
but if the meek shall inherit, then you’ll be
one of the first in line,
but I can’t wait, cause I got work to find,
family to feed, and lots of hurt inside.
And if the worst that I
could do is make coins from curses I
was handed down to write these verses, I
hope they collect ‘em in a book and then teach ‘em in every ghetto
‘bout the nigga after crumbs to get back like Hansel and Gretel.
[Hook: Dead Prez ]
“…sick…”
…sick of working for crumbs and filling up the prisons…”
“…sick, sick, sick, sick, sick of working for crumbs and filling up the prisons…”
“…sick of working for crumbs and filling up the prisons…”
“…relying on religion…”
[2: Truth]
Lord let us…
Momma used to pray
that Jesus would come and get us.
I really just prayed that the cops would never sweat us.
Midwest wind is rough without sweaters,
the salads without lettuce,
our kids without better
education and leaders
to elevate us and teach us
how we was sold on the beaches—
they separated and beat us.
Reparations,
they never say that we needed.
The cotton picking,
ain’t got a pot to piss in,
build up a lot of prisons,
fill ‘em up.
Pull us over like “get em up.”
Move, and they’ll hit you up.
Louima to Michael Brown—
laying the bible down.
The president promises,
brightens, admonishes
the curse and the punishments.
I’m done with it.
I’m a get mine and let the drummer get
what’s rightfully ours.
Sticking to the truth
as we writing these bars.
[Hook]
“…sick…”
…sick of working for crumbs and filling up the prisons…”
“…sick, sick, sick, sick, sick of working for crumbs and filling up the prisons…”
“…sick of working for crumbs and filling up the prisons…”
“…relying on religion…”
Documented
Producer: Truth
Additional vocals: Lesley McSpadden, Mobb Deep, Dead Prez, Aretha Franklin
BPM: 82.5
[Lesley McSpadden ]
“…doing too much. You don’t do a dog like that. You didn’t have to shoot him eight times. If he was doing something to you and you was trying to stop him, where do the police shoot you? In the leg. You just…shot all through my baby body…”
[1]
Raised in the streets. No surprise where we at.
J’s on my feet—Bull’s eyes on my back. Listen,
the thin line between better living and prison
is where I happen to get it. Can’t write me out of existence.
The sentences that I’m given are disproportionate.
Literacy’s important. Scribbling me distorted.
Written to reported. Luckily it’s recorded.
History won’t forget me like Emmet, Trayvon and Jordan.
And since the Birth of a Nation the curse that I’m facing
has hurt and helped disturb my relations
to my forefathers, my mother and my sisters. Suspect
if we all reap what we sow, know that when I collect.
I’m coming for souls. The white, and the blue and the red,
the life and the loss, the blood, sweat and tears that were shed—
return ‘em to me…
‘cause if you really earn what you keep…
…they’re all mine
[Hook: Mobb Deep , Dead Prez ]
“…when the slugs penetrate you feel a burning sensation…”
“…that’s why I write the shit I write in my raps…”
“…getting closer to God…”
“…when the slugs penetrate you feel a burning sensation…”
“…that’s why I write the shit I write in my raps…”
“…it’s documented. I’m in it…”
[2]
They told me to pray
Bend my knees and hope for a way
To be free. Forget man and focus on faith.
And I tried, but when I opened up my eyes I was lost,
Looking back, forward and side to side-by-side. Crying and caught
off guard,
Our Father Who art in heaven I ask:
White sheet or black face, why should I wear a mask?
If my choices are suicide or marching straight into slaughter;
I ain’t trying to play in the game, but can’t save me a quarter, then what do I do?
Not win, or say “Fuck it,” and lose.
A kamikaze mission—literally Catch 22.
Flyer than fuck. In my eyes you see what is up.
But you don’t really want to know, and you got reason enough
to do what you will. And so will I—future fulfilled.
Imagine hoping everyday that you live,
the way that you live. The way that you give
something is standing to fight. And I know I’m outnumbered. If it’s over tonight.
Then remember I said I was before knew it was planned.
I was a human being. I was a man.
[Hook]
“…when the slugs penetrate you feel a burning sensation…”
“…that’s why I write the shit I write in my raps…”
“…getting closer to God…”
“…when the slugs penetrate you feel a burning sensation…”
“…that’s why I write the shit I write in my raps…”
“…it’s documented. I’m in it…”
[3]
Was raised in the streets. No surprise where we at.
J’s on my feet—Bull’s eyes on my back. Listen,
the thin line between better living and prison
is where I happen to get it. Can’t write me out of existence.
The sentences that I’m given are disproportionate.
Literacy’s important. Scribbling me distorted.
Written to reported. Luckily it’s recorded.
History won’t forget me like Emmet, Trayvon and Jordan.
[Aretha Franklin ]
“Come all you fair and tender maidens.
Be careful how you love young men.
They’re like a star on a summer’s morn…”
80s
Producer: Truth
Additional vocals: Truth
BPM: 103
“…reports on a new kind of cocaine called ‘crack.’
It’s going nationwide, especially among the young. A drug so pure and so strong it might just as well be called ‘crack of doom’…”
“…in the nation’s biggest cities: New York, Los Angeles, Miami, and Chicago…”
[1: Truth]
At the end of Jim Crow
who would have thought that the outcome…
they took out Martin King and Malcolm.
Left was the Hueys, the Fred Hampton, Jr.
They found him,
shots to the head, no guns was around him.
Astounding,
they felt the nation was browning.
Currents that could make an impact, so they ground them.
Counter Intel
had the Intel.
Had the men jailed.
We was hanging on by a pin nail.
Broken,
black boy searching for income,
then come crack cocaine. Man, it’s been one.
The Contras and CIA, they sent some.
Dissolved in sodium bi.
That’s where the scent from.
Murder
and the gang banging the byproduct.
Killing niggas by the thousands, so why stop it?
President Reagan
played his best role being Satan.
The whole administration
facilitating crack in the eighties.
Crack.
[Hook: Truth]
Crack in the eighties.
Crack in the eighties.
A, yo, crack
and a nigga with a Mac acting crazy.
Leave the stash with his lady,
now it’s crack in the babies.
Crack in the eighties.
Crack in the eighties…
nigga with a Mac acting crazy.
“…in the nation’s biggest cities: New York, Los Angeles, Miami, and Chicago…”
[2]
In this New Jim Crow
my bro got a mandatory minimum—
and it wasn’t for him selling Ritalin.
New slaves—same thing as the old slaves.
Better check the 13th Amendment.
Same benefits, different percentages, same business,
big house where the niggas live.
They still locking niggas down without a share,
so black boys move white like Obama care.
He just tell ‘em pull they pants up and don’t loot.
In the street they yelling “Hands up. Don’t shoot.”
But we still getting shot on the spot. You ain’t safe if a
cop is a modern-day slave catcher.
He just there to oversee the plantation,
to help facilitate the damn nation’s
plan, which seems to be the man made into
labor for slave wages, or sell base like
crack in the eighties.
[Hook]
Crack in the eighties.
Crack in the eighties.
A, yo, crack
and a nigga with a Mac acting crazy.
Leave the stash with his lady,
now it’s crack in the babies.
Crack in the eighties.
Crack in the eighties…
nigga with a Mac acting crazy.
“…in the nation’s biggest cities: New York, Los Angeles, Miami, and Chicago…”
“…crimes with not-so-happy endings are criminals who need money to buy drugs or who are on drugs.
In the alphabet of illegal drugs, few have become so popular, so potent, so addictive, so fast
as what’s known on the street as crack.
Since CBS New reporter Harry Smith first investigated this the Crack Problem has become the Crack Crisis…”
Where I’m From
Producer: Amen Ra, The Mad Rapper
Additional vocals: N/A
BPM: 83
I’m from where the
murder rate is disturbing but no curbing the crime.
Time and time again you’ll find the swine has a purpose but trying
to protect and serve—ain’t the one you see ‘em doing.
Hear the pistol fire and it’s likely them that’s shooting.
Ain’t no policing the police, but at least we all know it.
And ain’t no dreaming in the streets about being a poet.
We owe it all to public schools where the rules is to show it
that you know the answers to the test but unless it’s an oval
that we filling in, then the feeling is like swimming and drowning.
And Black is Black. We don’t distinguish from cinnamon, brown and
mahogany, onyx and all of it’s chronic so we swallowing tonic
and wallowing all in it…see I find it ironic
that this is iconic. It’s marketed, so you want it, and I sell with promise.
And I can guarantee—
he’s got a bullet and a badge and took an oath to protect and to serve, but just a look
and he’s scared of me.
And I’m aware that he is, but I wonder are you.
And they ain’t asking you to freeze ‘fore they open and shoot.
I know you think “He got degrees,” but I’m hopeless as you.
A nigga with a PhD’s still a nigga when blue lights flash and I match the description
ain’t no explaining that.
Ain’t no amount of philosophy spit negating that.
Can’t quote a book and then hope you out,
if he’s got a badge and he believes that he can choke you out.
Hands up; stand up, and they shooting you down.
So keep your eyes on your mirror when you cruise through your town.
I’m from where the boys in blue don’t play.
Cough up a lung where I’m from—USA…
Shoot Back [Second Amendment]
Producer: Preme
Additional vocals: Malcolm X
BPM: 82.5
[Malcolm X]
“I was supposed to have said something about negroes should buy rifles.
White people been buying rifles all their lives…no commotion.”
“We’re supposed to be organizing some kind of negroes to arm themselves with rifles and shotguns for self-defense.
America is based upon the right of people to organize for self-defense. This is in the Constitution of the United States.”
[1]
Everybody seems to be concerned with the greater good,
say the last thing we need is guns in our neighborhoods.
But when I weigh the good against the hoods wearing ‘em
I think that if it’s legal maybe we should think of bearing ‘em.
By comparison, I’ll give you an analogy:
I’m Trayvon Martin. George Zimmerman is after me.
He’s got a pistol. And all I got is snacks on me.
He proceeds to chase, eventually’s attacking me.
A lot of people will probably see it as blasphemy,
but if I had a pistol on me, then, I could blast for me.
And maybe then there would have been a trial had for me
where I was the defendant to be convicted. Asking me,
is the prosecutor,
under oath, nastily,
“Did you really have to kill him?” I’d say, “Actually,
I was just standing my ground cause he was after me.”
Now compare that story to the reality.
[Hook 1]
We got Freddie Gray, Mike Brown, Tamir Rice,
and a whole bunch of people walking ‘round in fear like
we ain’t supposed to be mad. I’m thinking, “Yeah, right.”
How many people gotta die before it’s your fight?
How many people gotta suffer till you choose that?
It’s probably the most irresponsible, conscious, decision I’ve made to say this…
but I’m thinking shoot back.
[2]
It’s probably the most irresponsible, conscious, decision I’ve made to say this.
And a lotta people I know prob’ly won’t play this.
But fuck it. They say you have the constitutional right.
Who gone protect you as you move through the night?
You got media that’s malicious,
people starting militias,
they holding on to guns like it’s a part of they religion. Swear we coming to get ‘em.
They want they country back so
they avoid the fact that it was built on our backbones,
Revise history like The Man in the High Castle.
They want men like me to be cool with being they chattel.
But I ain’t on that slave shit.
I ain’t with that “Boss is you sick?”
The most you’ll get from me is a hock of this spit.
And that’s it.
I’m saying, ain’t no crime in standing my ground.
I ain’t gone wait for people standing around,
hope they recording it.
Nope.
If I’m danger and it’s from the police,
I’m supposed to call another police?
[Hook 2]
Rekia Boyd, Miriam Carey, Aiyana Jones…
all killed. We’re all here. They’re all gone.
We ain’t supposed to have fear? I’m thinking, “Y’all, wrong.”
How many people gotta die before it’s your song?
How many people gotta suffer till you choose that?
It’s probably the most irresponsible, conscious, decision I’ve made to say this…
but I’m thinking shoot back.
[3]
They say it’s better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.
And I ain’t saying nothing we don’t know, but to stop having to hashtag names
of blacks that’s slain
we must observe facts that’s plain.
And guns ain’t the answer; they the problem,
but the law of the land,
the same law that said I wasn’t a man,
says that I can keep and bear arms.
My sleeves rolled up so I can be prepared. I
Won’t be slowed up by people saying it’s a worse solution.
And what’s worse, these people don’t see it as persecution.
So, legally, I’m supposed to be me, and be free, and not live in fear,
when history says they do not want me here?
I’m thinking well-regulated militia. Who gone police the police?
Oh, we’re gone wait until they kill some more of us on the streets?
[Malcom X]
“The second amendment to the Constitution, uh,
spells out the right of people…”
[Hook 1+2]
We got Freddie Gray, Mike Brown, Tamir Rice,
and a whole bunch of people walking ‘round in fear like
we ain’t supposed to be mad. I’m thinking, “Yeah, right.”
How many people gotta die before it’s your fight?
How many people gotta suffer till you choose that?
It’s probably the most irresponsible, conscious, decision I’ve made to say this…
but I’m thinking shoot back.
Rekia Boyd, Miriam Carey, Aiyana Jones…
all killed. We’re all here. They’re all gone.
We ain’t supposed to have fear? I’m thinking, “Y’all, wrong.”
How many people gotta die before it’s your song?
How many people gotta suffer till you choose that?
It’s probably the most irresponsible, conscious, decision I’ve made to say this…
but I’m thinking shoot back.
Good Mourning, America
Producer: N/A
Additional vocals: N/A
BPM: N/A
“I remember that I’m invisible and walk softly so as not to awaken the sleeping ones. Sometimes it is best not to awaken them; there are few things in the world as dangerous as sleepwalkers.”
—Ralph Waldo Ellison
This is the Next Time. Prepare for Fire.
The grotesque fantasy of the shrinking so-called majority,
America’s nightmare, is slowly transitioning from
somnolent slumber to a waking state akin to sleepwalking.
America, for as long as it has existed, openly endorsed terror,
and rode the wave of fear that followed to super-powered dominance,
domestically and abroad.
To be clear, when I say “America,” I mean “White America”—the America
America sees, wants to see. Not the real America, but the ideal America.
The America that stated, equal “All men are created” while enslaving men and women
who legally counted 2/5 less than their American Masters.
America, the Beautiful, who “crowns” her “good with Brotherhood,”
but from sea to shining sea shoots down and locks up
young black boys and girls, men and women, with impunity.
This is the Next Time. Prepare for Fire.
America’s Nightmare is America waking up.
“Good Morning,” America says.
Good Morning America says,
“Good Morning, America.” Says,
“Good. Mourning America says you’re a true patriot.
Don’t let America die. Don’t let America’s death be in vain. Fight!
For America. This is
good mourning.
The black and brown bruises on the American Body
must be cut off, must be amputated
or risk infection spreading.
Sleep, America. This is an age-old procedure. Perfected.
Or inject local anesthetic, remove bruise. Move. Repeat procedure. Or
just sleep. It’ll all be over when you wake up.”
This is the Next Time. Prepare for Fire.
This is America burning. This is America: learning
this is no nightmare.
This is America waking up, realizing
its bruises have not been removed, may not be removable,
and trying, trying, trying to remove these imperfections,
or risk infection s p r e a d i n g,
this black becoming blacker,
this brown becoming MORE,
this body belonging to this mind that has perfected seeing itself
as pristine. This is America operating,
White America cutting into her Native skin,
excising what
does not belong, what she does not want to see.
Cut deeper. Cut
to the White. It burns, but it’s worth burning.
Not seeing it must be worth the price.
This
is America screaming: “THIS IS AMERICA!”
waking up.
This is the Next Time. Prepare for Fire.
The remains will be Black.
This is America on the brink of break—
ever aware of a two-ness of which there is a constitutional greater
and lesser, necessary evils that history won’t heal and
Hennessey won’t help,
darkness and lightness created in the likeness of
White God and White Jesus
who would rather see White America burn than see it turn
into what it already is,
what it always was.
America becoming awake, America becoming aware,
is America becoming so scared of what she knows she is capable
of doing to herself.
Dream sweet, America. Dream deep. Breathe deeper.
Now deeper. And sleep.
Sleep.
You were made from this.
You were made for this.
You were made by this.
You are on fire.
This is the Next Time.
America is burning.
“God gave Noah the rainbow sign,
No more water, the fire next time!”
—Quoted by James Baldwin