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1. |
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Verse 1:
Your history books (lies)/ Your holidays (lies)
Thanksgiving lies and Columbus Day
Tell me why I know more than the teacher
Tell me why I know more than the preacher
Tell me why you think the red man is red
Stained with the blood from the land you bled
Tell me why you think the red man is dead
With a fake headdress on your head
Tell me what you know about thousands of Nations
Displaced and confined to concentration camps called reservations
We died for the birth of your nation
Hollywood portrays us wrong (like savages)
History books say we're gone (like savages)
Your god and church say we're wrong (like savages)
We're from the Earth, it made us strong
Chorus
What made the red man red (4x)
Verse 2:
Savages is as savage does
The white man came and ravaged us
Caused genocide/ look in my eyes
and tell me who you think the savages was
Bridge (2x):
Manifest destiny arrested what's best for me
They kill my culture/ America made a mess of me
You inherited everything we die for and all we get is a got damn mascot
Bridge:
You made me red when you killed my people
Made me red when you bled my tribe
Made me red when you killed my people
(Like savages/ Like savages)
Chorus
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2. |
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Bridge (Frank Waln)
Come down to the dungeon now (2x)
When the darkness comes around (2x)
Chorus
Hot summer nights & we’re in the basement (2x)
Cold winter days & we’re in the basement (2x)
Just cooking up that Native shit (2x)
Trying to get this fire lit (2x)
Verse 1 (Frank Waln)
I left school just to follow the flow/ Them damn white kids were draining my soul
Landed me out in Chicago/ Never ever saw a city so cold
I ain’t never have nothing but my music and my tribe/ Young storyteller coming from the rez live
There’s only so much I can even describe so I spit rhymes as good as the government lies
Saved money just so I could build a studio/ built a studio so I could save money
Cuz on the Rez ain’t no one have money/ Now my cousin’s basement is a studio
Star quilts for a booth/ write a song a day/ Never ever thought my music would be on it’s way
All I do is ghost out/ I’m in the basement/ I don’t ever see the light of day
Chorus
Verse 2 (Dre)
Damn I can remember and I truly must admit/ that I really should be sorry for the heat that I spit
In the basement back then man I really said some tragic sh sh sh sh sh
Should I say it? My daughter’s gonna be listening
Down the road as she grows but I’m thankful that my boys ain’t take it with them as they grow
Yeah I said it/ don’t correct my grammar/ back then I had no manners
I was cussing all the time and my rhymes couldn’t man up
Hope this time I stand up/ Hooks to the pavement
My mind’s still racing but not like it did in my old basement
I had a job while rhyming/ I was daddy while I was rhyming
But now I’m really climbing/ a line man/ I’m light man
To the dark places/ just face this you can’t compete
With Dre and Rollie back on a Frank Dubb beat
And we in another basement/ it’s not the old basement
But when I think about it, I found warmth in my basement
Chorus
Verse 3 (Rollie Raps)
I was 17 with better things ahead of me
instead of being focused on the music I was set on being dopeboy
Party hard/ I wasn’t ready mentally
I drop bills to pop/ the pain pills I bought
We’re temporary fixes/ I’m stuck inside the rez and life is getting very vicious
I’m running from the stress and I’m suspicious of snitches
People getting popped and plus my pops locked away
I bottle popped the pain and pushed on
I wrote my pain inside the book I rolled my kush on
I used to sleep inside the booth and leave the hooks on
I used the basement as a blanket just to block out the wrongs
I knocked out a song like bang bang
Living life on the rez it’s all the same thing
It’s either prison or death and that’s my main pain
Because my mom’s using meth
I’m trying to maintain I can’t/ My brain ain’t the same
The basement
Bridge (Tom Schmidt)
Get goosebumps
Get goosebumps
When you bump this out
Bump bump this out (2x)
Bridge (Frank Waln)
Come down to the dungeon now (2x)
When the darkness comes around (2x)
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3. |
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Rollie Raps:
I’m damned if i do or do not/ Thinking like damn could i make it to the top
I could I be the man with a bold plan and go ham/ show fans that I won’t stop
hip hop’s like all on my mind, all of my time goes to starting a rhyme, bars in a line
heart and mind on my grind, grind on my mind, out here, tryin to find, light
in the times where darks all around me/ people tellin me,
can’t go to far with a felony,
I’d rather be deaf, when you speaking on me negative
I won’t let what you say be your benefit
I can’t stress this enough am i clear? / don’t press this up in my ear
I won’t rest till the dusts in the air/ I’m in love with the lust and the stares
Im Damned if i do or do not/ aww Man, Ima hit it on the spot
Top notch Dawg, the rap god, imma go give this all that I’ve got
Tell um like/ Andale/ Imma play on this, song and astonish up on it
Polish it, bond it with honest, palms that i honor with logic
Bomb I’m just conquering all this/ I’ll just evolve as a artsist
Constantly harming these bars and harmonies/ how many call this
godly/ it’s hardly, a hobby, I’d be a zombie if all these
songs weren’t all launch up from on me
Honestly Imma be called the god
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4. |
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Verse 1
College graduate/ captain catalyst/ rapping rez boy/ a college panelist
Riding wild beats/ trunks are rattling/ my demons battling/ you’ve been a fan of this
Red road runner/ red boy wonder/ lyrics like lightning/ heart like thunder
Hot like summer/ cool like fall/ music spread from rez to rez like ball
Raised on commodities/ made me a prodigy/ America and her colonies can’t abolish me
A hipster in a headdress still ain’t as hot as me/ 7th generation living breathing prophecy
Heal our ancestors from the otherside/ hear my ancestors everytime I rhyme
Feel my ancestors everytime I move/ Rosebud boy/ time for me to bloom
Speak my truth got flows galore/ tore the roof off when they closed the door
Proud of my home and it shows for sure/ Everybody as one help me raise it more
Chorus
From the city to the rez make it hot boy (2x)
There ain’t nothing out here that’s gonna stop me (2x)
Verse 2
Toss me the mic/ I’m a beast when I’m on the stage
Out the cage/ MC rocking double braids/ Let them sway/ my music bang
Remember back on the Rez when we used to hang
We ain’t have a lot/ but you had my back/ That’s why I Rosebud rep when I rap
Lakota soldier Rollie told ya boy/ flow is colder now/ we taking over boy
So many times I almost quit and put the mic down
So many rhymes I gotta spit to get the right sound
White America keep telling me to pipe down
They’re tight wound for standing up on my ground
Settlers be peddlers of the white lies/ blue bloods be lost souls in disguise
Your red benz was paid for with red skins/ your safe life was paid for with my rights
But i’m here to let the world know now/ ancestors live through our flow now
Never slowed down/ came a long way
Said I’ll never change/ what the song say?
Chorus
Instrumental outro
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5. |
Treaties
04:50
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Intro (Suzan Harjo):
The treaty story, of course, begins before there was a United States because it was nation to nation amongst the Native nations and the European nations.
The story’s told with lies/ lies/ lies
The treaty signed
*newscast snippet
“Since the founding of this country the US government has made and broken over 500 treaties with various Indian tribes all across our nation”
The war was lost
The treaty signed
I had leave my life behind
I live among you well disguised
I has a name but nevermind
Verse 1 (Faith Spotted Eagle):
They were unilateral agreements between two sovereigns
Meaning that it was Indigenous people here and the US government
And it was equal
We still retain that
The other way that it’s supported and retained even though the US government refuses sometimes to recognize that
And maybe these younger people that are listening to this can change this
Because this is about healing
It’s about forgiving
Do you know what the sixth article of the US constitution is?
That treaties are the supreme law of the land
It actually says that in the US constitution
Treaties are the supreme law of the land
Chorus:
The treaty signed (3x)
And truth that dies
The treaty signed (3x)
And truth that dies
You serve them well I’m not surprised
You’re of their kin
You’re of their kind
You served them well I’m not surprised
I had a name but nevermind
(Various samples):
“You know it turns out that the problem with treaties begins not on the Native side, but like many problems, begins on the western side”
“the US government has made and broken over 500 treaties with various Indian tribes all across our nation”
Verse 2 (Suzan Harjo):
Most of the non Native people think of Indian treaties as “Indian treaties”
They don’t think of them as their treaties
And these are everyone’s treaties
These are the United States and the Native Nations
And we all have rights and we all have responsibilities
The United States gained a territory over which to govern through treaties
If you don’t know treaties
Now I’m not talking about treaty law
But if you don’t know treaties
You just don’t know american history
But nevermind
The treaty signed (3x)
Bridge:
Why is it important the American people understand this?
I mean most people study a little bit about Native American history in school
But then, for many, I think it disappears from our daily news diet
So why was this important and specifically the Treaties
Why look at the Treaties
Verse 3 (Kevin Grover):
We felt the United States/ we felt the people
Needed a civics lesson and a reminder
That the constitution doesn’t just refer to the federal government and the state governments
It ask refers to the Indian tribes
Chorus:
The treaty signed (3x)
And truth that dies
The treaty signed (3x)
And truth that dies
This is about healing
This is about healing
Younger people healing
Younger people healing
This about healing (2x)
Outro:
The war was lost
The treaty signed
I was not caught
I crossed the line
I was not caught
Though many tried
I live among you well disguised
*newscast snippet
“Since the founding of this country the US government has made and broken over 500 treaties with various Indian tribes all across our nation”
But nevermind
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6. |
7 feat. Tanaya Winder
05:40
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Intro (Tanaya Winder)
Always start with you
Alive and well
And not me
I’d gladly give up every poem I have spoken
Have my mouth call back each and every one of them
From your ears
Back into my pen’s failed attempts at trying to put back
The splintered pieces of our hearts
Our hearts
Our hearts
Staring at a blank page
Wishing
We could begin again
Verse
Thousands warriors will come rushing in/ our ancestors waged war with the government/ in the spirit of Spotted Tail and John Trudell/ this is spiritual awakening/ they feed us lies but we won’t take them in/ let us ride on the lands where our ancestors died/ breathing life into our cultures they said were petrified/ they tell a history that our peoples don’t recognize/ the US government should be charged with genocide/ spitting rhymes in a time of blood quantum and suicide/ we survived staying strong all those times we should’ve died/ I confess I’m depressed/ sometimes I can’t take the stress/ living is a test, distressed up in the wild west/ my fam suffers/ the land suffers/ I hate the silence/ I hate statistics/ I hate the prisons/ I hate the violence/ I hate these politicians making the wrong decisions/ I hate these men that inflict this violence upon our women/ they hate to see us rise/ we’re on their tv man/ remind these settlers that they’re up on treaty land/ I did this with my music/ a cd in my hand/ a microphone in the other now watch me take a stand
Chorus
This is sound of a Nation rising
A generation with a vision
We’re tired of our people dying
7th generation we have risen/ we have risen yeah
This is sound of a Nation rising
A generation with a vision
We hear our Mother Earth crying
7th generation we have risen/ we have risen yeah
Bridge
This system try to hold us down/ it hold us down
you forced our cultures underground/ underground
But you ain’t stopping no one now/ no one now
We’re stronger and we know it now/ we know it now
Verse
I ghost dance over drums/ my music speaks to the young/ I give my heart for the people/ the revolution’s begun/ we’re standing stronger than ever when history weighs a ton/ I’m giving thanks to Creator and suffering with the sun/ my mother says I’m her son/ my people say I’m the one/ my microphone/ it inspire/ I fire it like a gun/ higher into you privilege conspiring with the spirits/ my environment require my lyrics be the exhibit of genius that has a plan/ my allegiance is with the land my people agreed to care for therefore I’m gonna make a stand/ my freedom is nonexistent convenient to uncle sam/ they’re colonizing our minds/ we’re compromising their plans/ our knowledge lives in the land/ the answers live in our youth/ the cancers live in our elders/ I’m trying to see the truth/ my brothers and sister suffer while people silence our voices/ you hold our mouths shut then tell us that we are voiceless/ fuck that you don’t listen/ privilege is your tradition/ our people in your prisons/ our sisters end up missing/ I petition my position to live in conditions that kill my people now feel my vision
Chorus
This is sound of a Nation rising
A generation with a vision
We’re tired of our people dying
7th generation we have risen/ we have risen yeah
This is sound of a Nation rising
A generation with a vision
We hear our Mother Earth crying
7th generation we have risen/ we have risen yeah
Outro (Tanaya)
Battles wouldn’t end in bloodshed
But instead
A ride off into a sun rising
With warriors always returning from war
Warriors always returning from war
Bridge
This system try to hold us down/ it hold us down
you forced our cultures underground/ underground
But you ain’t stopping no one now/ no one now
We’re stronger and we know it now/ we know it now
(3x)
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7. |
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Verse 1
I just wanna run
I’ve been running since the summertime
I feel the time has come
To face these monsters of mine
I said I wasn’t gonna leave but I did
Fell in love we were young/ we were kids
We don’t even really know what we did
And they ain’t gotta ever know what we hid
My love died where the beats collide
My love died where the beats collide
My love died where my beasts reside
Our love died where our beasts reside
Chorus (Kodi DeNoyer & Frank Waln)
Wake up with the blues
Blue skies take a cruise
This city ain’t my home
You left me here alone
Dark skies seem so surreal
I can’t tell her how I feel
I can’t tell her how I feel
Verse 2
I just wanna run
I’ve been running since the winter time
My mother called her son
And I lied and said that I’m fine
What the use of it?
They ain’t ready for the truth of it
Drag our hearts through the dirt cuz you love it
Gotta give them what they want give them what they need
Love is like salt to the wound let it bleed
My love died where the beats collide
My love died where the beats collide
My love died where my beasts reside
Our love died where our beasts reside
Chorus (Kodi DeNoyer & Frank Waln)
Wake up with the blues
Blue skies take a cruise
This city ain’t my home
You left me here alone
Dark skies seem so surreal
I can’t tell her how I feel
I can’t tell her how I feel
Bridge
Running is numbing I know
I just can’t feel anymore (4x)
Verse 3
Abandoned bastard sons/ our daddies taught us how to run
Leave without a trace/ except bruises on the face of the one you love
Generation broken heart
Our moms taught us how to chase those who never cared
I’m aware that love don’t care about what’s fair
Still I carry the traits that ruin what they had
My biggest fear in life, I become my dad
I become my mother/ codependent lover
I become my dad/ moving undercover
My love died when their hearts collide
My love died when their hearts collide
Outro
Got the pain in your heart now (2x)
Got the hurt that you can’t shake (2x)
Got the love in your heart now
You got the love in your heart now
She got the love in her heart now
You got the love in her heart now
You gotta trust in your heart now
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8. |
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sometimes i wish we could start back
at the beginning. turn our existence into a videotape
call it Life. then push Life into a VCR.
press PLAY then PAUSE and get the chance to
REWIND with our image still on screen
watching everything that ever meant anything reverse
with the push of a finger.
if we could press REWIND
the wrinkles on these God given shells would smooth
into soft unscathed skin. we’d awaken from tombs,
arise from the earth like trees living to become seeds,
and i guess that means as babies we’d go back in to our mother’s wombs.
if we could press REWIND
mothers or fathers who abandoned
their daughters or sons wouldn’t walk away but return,
run backwards turning towards their children.
then they’d never have to look into eyes
that ever saw them as unworthy of keeping.
history wouldn’t repeat, but instead fold into itself
like disease-ridden blankets rolling themselves back up
like yo-yos returning to the hands that made those hateful gestures
in the first place. battles wouldn’t end
in bloodshed, but instead a ride off into a sun rising
with warriors always returning from war
or boarding schools with their hair flowing behind them in lengths of rivers.
REWINDing, would mean
handing in our diplomas & going back to school
to unlearn all the lessons ever taught to us. we’d start
books at their ending, unstring sentences into letters until
all we were left with was sound waiting
to come out of our mouths. like my friend Angel,
his would open to fountain gallons of vodka
from liver, his throat would spill it back into bottle
after bottle after bottle after bottle
that he’d set back onto the shelves of a liquor store
he’d walk out of in a line so straight it’d lead him
to the day Angel’s father cut off his wings when he left him,
fatherless, falling asleep on a bench.
REWINDing,
he’d unfreeze to death as warmth re-entered
his body convulsing not in dry heaving but reheating
detoxing into calm as snowflakes would slowly rise back up to the sky.
the kind of miracle time travel – imagine,
needles sucking poisonous drugs from addicted veins, pills
un-dissolving into wholeness being pushed back into containers
fitting just right. everything would be all right.
especially for our youth who contemplated taking their own lives
or committed suicide would feel blood flow back into open cuts,
their veins pulsing with life that knows it’s worth saving
so much that determined hands repeatedly pull away razors
from wrists until every scar slowly disappeared leaving behind no trace,
not even the memory. and every fist that hit someone in rage or abuse
would loosen into outstretched arms to call you home
instead of the bullet shaped holes being shot into bodies
making their way back into the guns or mouths
that shot them in the first place.
if we could REWIND
maybe i could remember
if i ever said anything to hurt Angel.
if we could REWIND,
my Angel would be able to fly
backwards, defy gravity, lift himself up and
life would be breathed back into him
as he unwrapped the rope from his neck
to inhale sweet and ever expanding air into his chest.
if we could REWIND
i could tell Angel, over & over i loved you
and it would always always start with –
you, alive & well and not me.
i’d give up every poem i have ever spoken,
have my mouth call back each and every one of them
from your ears back into my pen
’s failed attempts at putting back together
all the splintered pieces of our
hearts our hearts our hearts
our hearts staring at a blank page,
wishing we could
begin again.
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9. |
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Chorus:
We’ll do it in a Good Way, Good Way, Good Way (4x)
Verse 1 Gunner Jules:
I could never really tell the difference of who you wanted to be, and who really are
Who really are?
Pot holes on the boulevard, in a foreign car
Like they all say
I’ll keep you safe like Allstate
Ball so hard got all-state on an off day
What they all say, what they all say.
Rollie Raps Verse 1
Bless up, better step up
Put your best up, When the stakes highs
Put your bets up, from the get up
When you get up, better dress up
Not to get by, but to excel
When you’re in hell, but it ends well
So you inhale, till you get high
And you feel like, you just can't fail
Gunner Jules verse 2
What we dream of is a piece of what we needin
Life is the key and we need love, I believe love, I believe in
Fight for your piece and your freedom
What we become, how we speakin
The ride of your life put the key in
Love and become your reason, your beacon
Rollie Raps Verse 2
So just live for the moment
Put it all in
On the ball, cuz tomorrow's not promised
Never go through the motions
Sail your own ship
Cuz this life is a ocean
Put your most in, pick your head up
Put the hate down, pick a friend up
But no matter what we do, we'll do what we do
Chorus (2x)
Frank Waln Verse
You’ve been up and down this road too many times
searching for something in them you’ll never find
I know you know love is blind/ but you never learned love is kind
you’ve been waiting your whole life to find out who you are
these people judge your skin but still they fail to see your scars
everything you’re looking for out there is deep inside
your heart is like an ocean when it’s open deep and wide
you gotta keep hustling for your family
struggling for your justice
forget if they ain’t with it
forget them if they’re judging
nothing can ever stop you
when your ancestors got you
so no matter what we do/ we’ll do what we do
Chorus (2x)
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10. |
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Verse 1:
89 we say hello/ he says goodbye
daddy left when I was 3 and made us cry
you and I clyde and bonnie of modern day
drama came and friends left but mamma stayed
through everything/ all the fights and all the pain
all the change/ I hate my dad don’t want his name
told my mom that I’m a Waln didn’t understand
all the things going on between her and my dad
but I was stubborn/ I know that I make it hard
you always said “son I know you’re gonna make it far”
believe that I need that in dark times
I think of what you did for me and my heart shines
You took my hand up this mountain made it your climb
So when I shine, mom you shine
Yeah a single mother with the odds stacked
Raised a king one day I’ll bring it all back
Chorus:
Lived all my life just me and you
Times got tough and you’ve seen me through
I ain’t have a dad and we ain’t have a plan
Raised by a woman who made me a man
I know I ain’t home and your boy is grown
I need you to know that you’re not alone
I can let it rock you will be my stone
Forever in my heart you will be my stone
Bridge:
Ina Mitawa (my mother in Lakota) I couldn’t do this alone
Verse 2:
You always gave me what I needed somehow always found the time
Single parent it’s apparent that you stayed up on your grind
I remember you would put me first
It was hard but you said “son it could be worse”
And you were right/ it’s funny
Looking back days were sunny
You kept me smiling even though we didn’t have the money
That other people did/ somehow you made it happen
I promise mom that I’m gonna do it with this rapping
Cuz you took me everywhere in my cap and my backpack
20 years later now I’m rapping in snapbacks
rocking the long braids/ we came a long way
you kept me on the right road away from the wrong way
forever I’m grateful/ for the life you gave
the tears that we cried the sacrifice you made
Yeah a single mother with the odds stacked
Raised a king one day I’ll bring it all back
Chorus
Outro:
All the problems in the world couldn’t tear us apart
All the traumas in the world couldn’t tear us apart
Mom, you’re my heart
You’re my heart
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Frank Waln Rosebud, South Dakota
Award winning Hip Hop artist/producer from the Rosebud Reservation.
Sicangu Lakota.
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