Sacred Texts (Original Version)

from What We Leave Behind by Gabriel Teodros

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lyrics

it's been a long time...
ya'll never heard of us, that's fine
i've been Vibin' since Tribe was Maruadin through Midnights
a follower of Styles of the Fellowship, Free
to create me through mixtape spacing
and i remember when a Resurrection saved me
my Sense was in Common with this fool i never seen
from a city that i know i've never been to
but it rained plus he, felt the pain like me
influenced by P.E. & BDP
Ice Cube, Roy Ayers & Bob Marley
my headphones then, were my only company
i was awkward socially, never fit into a peer group
imagine growing up with only music there to hear you
it's only there to heal you, pierce to the root
it can hurt while it moves you and shock you to life
what else would i do ya'll, if i didn't write? record & perform songs?
options are long gone and far out of sight
cause i remember 1995 "it's a suiciiiide"
felt like it's Me Against The World plus i was Ready To Die
scribing with my first pad, pen
listening to Pac when they sniped him (damn)
now i'm still writing, reciting & rocking with a mic in palm
it's like 7 years gone and i can't stay calm
they still got me feeling Trapped like a walking time bomb
and i need this now more then i ever have
call it hip hop, rock, soul, blues or the jazz
music of the future
fuck bringing it back

heart chasing
from mixtape making
to basement cathedrals
we drew sacred texts on these walls
and respond whenever, wherever the spirit calls
they talk to us and walk through us
they talk to us and walk through us

and i don't even have a minute to hate
there's too much to do for justice now
so i livicate this one for love
like Mamie Till-Mobley did for her son
knowing that these lynchings are still going on
and on me, i can't even fathom that focused calmness just yet
like a single mother gets when poverty tightens it's grip
and her kids don't understand what having no money is
when a reflex to live is all that you know you got
dancing cuz your spirits caught
you'd rather body rock til your body rots
than to feel a world without music
the blues don't stop
another child gets shot, and the cops are the culprits
a woman gets raped
and the number one suspect could be her best friend
many men don't comprehend
we didn't start the fire
this violence created us
yet we still perpetuate it
and i don't know who to trust
i don't believe in no fantasy R&B kind of love
i don't need to helplessly fall in to fear of what
life what be like without limits, empty traditions,
out of date definitions from a colonizer's tongue
dig it?
i'm building here, specifically, Northwest Pacific speech
Southend to CD regions, reaching peeps
wake from they sleep singing this melody, like yo...
they said God believes in me, do i believe in me?
yes i believe in me, nobody else could set me free

heart chasing
from mixtape making
to basement cathedrals
we drew sacred texts on these walls
and respond whenever, wherever the spirit calls
they talk to us and walk through us
they talk to us and walk through us

credits

from What We Leave Behind, released June 24, 2020
Produced by Budo
...at least we think it's Budo. No one actually remembers producing or recording this song. We think based on the quality it's from sometime between 2003-2005, and that Gabriel Teodros engineered it himself at The MAD Lab when the studio was in Khazm's folks basement. No one really remembers it though.

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