For this song, I wanted to convey just how awful the world feels right now for a lot--nah, MOST--of people.
Stylistically, I was going for a compromise between two ideas: the minimalist rap of something like Whitey On The Moon by Gil Scott-Heron, and the sample/synth-heavy rap of... well, a lot of periods, but mostly everything up to the early 2000s.
I'm just trying to live my life
But I got an Orange Man causing us extra strife
Every day it's something new
Over the cuckoo's nest is where he flew
Muslim, Latino, African, and Asian
Lesbian, Gay, Bi, Trans, and Queer
Poor, worker, even white rich men
Nobody is safe besides those who bribe him
With his self-loathing, self-absorption,
And self-destructive narcissism
I'm sick to death of being constantly fucking sick of
The haves and the have-nots
The C.R.E.A.M. of the crop
Cash rules everything around us
And we all get thrown under the bus
How have so few people realized
That slavery still exists for you and me
It's just modern Feudalism, disguised
See, the root of all evil is MONEY
And the leaders of the world
Got everybody fighting
Words of nationalism are hurled
And everybody's biting
This mentality of us vs. them
Has got to stop, friend
Or else we're all gonna bigly lose
To the best, greatest, biggest, orange flooze
How are we supposed to make ends meet
When we got a culture of everyone being elite
How are we supposed to make ends meet
When we got a culture of everyone being elite
How are we supposed to make ends meet
When we got a culture of everyone being elite
How are we supposed to make ends meet
When we got a culture of everyone being elite
America was for sale half a century ago
And nobody cared enough to save it
Now we've got another round of Jim Crow
And a climate so bad you just wanna blaze it
I've got a personal story anyone could embody
I got hit by a car, and all could see
I was not at fault; that's the key
But the witness lied in the face of my plea
The perpetrator is rich, PhD and law degree
But a great lawyer and insurance couldn't get me any money
So I had to spend thousands on what should be free
Accident-induced bills and painful tooth surgery
But despite it all, I consider myself lucky
Because I came out of it healed and free
Despite growing up poor from at least age three
I barely had enough resources to stand tall like a tree
If a law is unjust, a man is not only right to disobey it, he is obligated to do so
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it
You heard Jefferson, brothers and sisters
We're going to keep moving forward and fix our messes one-by-one
We're going to live our god damn lives, and if someone means to do us harm, they will not succeed if we stand together
Stuff like this is recommended in my BC collection: bandcamp.com/jimibove. Anything that isn't in there isn't because it didn't show up for some reason. That stuff is listed below. Jimi-James