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Higher Learning

by Mercury the Maroon

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1.
2.
The Wakeup 01:57
(Time to wake up and smell the "Bush" shit in the morning) Whippin through the Uptown landscape/ My man makes paper on the corner-five years, he a goner/ He's become a karma-karma chamelion/ Why all the good ones thinking they need a gun?/ Where we from, the cops are the criminals/ And ain't a damn thing subliminal/ Punks got minerals, move 'em to any hood, they generals/ And pit bulls, word to the syllable/ No more hooked on phonics/ Got the finest hydroponic science projects/ I was moving weight before I was lifting 'em/ Short you on 'caine, can't afford to be sniffin it/ What's the difference how you die/ When you slated for extinction in 2005, they gon fry the ghetto/ The fall guy gon' be another nigger who be smiling on TV with a shiny medal/ When the bloodclaat decease can settle/ Mek dem release the duppies fi dem sleep in peace/ We sacrificing a chicken after we lick 'em dirty/ Life in the same position till she hit thirty/ Lil' purdy got two birdies to worry 'bout/ She don't want a dick in their mouth for sure B!/ Learn the curb, the sidewalk/ The turf jive talk/ How to hide a fork in a knife drawer/ And WAKEUP!
3.
On The Move 02:39
I'm on the move, I lose if I stop/ Cops on the cruise and the news on the watch/ It's half past two on the dot/ I'm late for my interview with Sliwa and Koch/ They wanna hear my views on the new-New York/ Will we ever scrape the heavens like before 9/11?/ Steady on the road to forgetting/ My past is behind me, west, about two more exits/ Float like a butterfly, sting like a bullet/ Spread like a butter knife, bread is influence/ Money, get it right/ You lost confusing the gas, and the light/ And a mop, and a broom/ And a task, and a duty/ I'm on the move, Illuminati pursuing me/ I'm in the movies/ I'm in the schools, I'm in the court rooms, Judy/ I'm in the food we eat, I'm in the loosies/ I'm in the Dutch, I'm in the Philly, anything you wanna touch/ You best believe I had my hand in it/ I could've ran with it/ I was a bad tenant, but/ I ain't paying rent, and I ain't getting evicted... Chorus I'm on the move, I'm on the move before they lock me and stop my groove/ I'm on the move, I'm on the move before they cock back and pop a nigga... Speeding down the runway/ Send a helicopter to stop the plane/ I'm already sipping on champagne/ First-class treatment, never heard such warm greetings or slept in such clean sheets/ The ones that I threw away as old as Jesus/ Remind me of the days when I was a heathen/ I'm on the move, I lose if I stop/ Cops on the cruise and the news on the watch/ My ego is bruise so I soothe it with Scotch/ Out with the stewardess for cocktails and lobster/ I'm on the move to a brighter tomorrow/ Where there ain't no drama/ Please light my Menorah/ Won't be able to tell night from the morning/ But you still see me hyper as hell, never yawning/ Lord had his mercy on me/ So I'ma transform 360 degrees...
4.
Draft Day 04:54
Chorus Draft Day, take me to war if you catch me/ Cuz I'ma run away... Now a few Arabs have called me nigger/ Took a couple planes, took out a couple buidlings/ But I don't have the feeling to retaliate no quicker/ Hate to see the sight of innocent women and children/ Chocolate or vanilla, murdered over bullshit/ Race and religion, executive decisions/ Smart bombs with no brains missing with precision/ It's hard to tell a soldier from a hitman/ The coke and coco from the same plant/ Grown with the same supervision/ Nigga listen.../ Miles away, violence lays dormant in search of its prey/ And orphans are born into war/ As day turns to night, night turns to day/ I leave one eye open, keep my hands near an arm/ As day turns to night, night turns to day/ If I'm alive, I'ma have to march on...on Chorus Good God, I think they let the beast loose in the wild, wild East/ Get a truce/ Don't wanna be deceased/ Not at least till I fix my teeth/ And leave bites and marks on the beast/ Upheaval, poor people fed up/ Of eating pork, death from a fork/ Leaders need to get up and free us/ I don't wanna find peace in a machine gun/ But my life ain't living like a re-run/ So what's happening is I ain't backing down/ When I'm rapping now, I ain't laughing/ I ain't a happy camper, I'm a tantrum thrower/ Burning holes in my blankets/ As night turns to day, day turns to night/ I'ma fight with the devil in my dreams/ As night turns to day, day turns to night/ I'ma fight with the devil till he scream...on Chorus Verse 3
5.
TCB 01:35
Chorus Who crazier than me/ Except my neighbors from this mental slavery/ It got us caged up, was this all meant to be/ Do you save a slave mind or let it roam free? All of my peoples rocked Jheri Curls in the eighties/ Now they straighten it out with TCB/ Keep it away from flames, there's no more danger unless you can read/ Between the fingers flipping through a magazine/ Full of strangers to the ghetto/ Like reindeer to the devil/ The same fear that got me carrying heavy metal instead of carrying a spear/ Got me building with Legos instead of steel/ If life's a poker game, my niggas got the raw deal/ Got the raw coke to cook up, the smoke make you look up/ And jump back to Earth like you Superfly Snukka/ The Hood's in a figure four/ I give a little more time before it's Civil War/ Nigga which side you on? Chorus
6.
MarynMe 03:39
Chorus What you smokin on, tokin on?/ Bambu, Dutch Master, Backwood, or bong?/ Bubbler to one hitter, Phillie Blunt to Swisher/ Optimo to Garcias/ You know we keep on filling 'em! You can say I smoke a lot, joke a lot/ Keep an O in my sock to keep my eyes like a polka dot/ Arizona to California, homegrown to laboratory/ Roach spray to opium, no matter what I'm asking for it/ Cops come, I got my story, visiting my mans/ They search me but ain't know I had on two pairs of pants/ Now it's forward with the plans/ Go and link up with the crew/ Can't forget the Bambu plus a pocketful of blend/ I'm a stoner-can't-pretend-I'm-ever-sober/ I begin-to-lose-the-high-I-go-and-buy-a-little-more-from-my vendor/ two for five, eight for twenty, right on the money/ I never fuck with Columbian weight, them prices is funny/ Don't want no gram, don't want no eighth/ Don't want no scam, no bag of shake/ Just give me what I need! Chorus Repeat verse 1
7.
Saturday 04:23
Chorus It's a Saturday/ And I don't wanna do a damn thing/ I just wanna do what I wanna do/ If that's okay I ain't brushing my teeth, I ain't scrubbing my balls at all/ It's a Saturday morning/ Hit the Fulton mall, try to pick up a shorty/ Maybe a sugar mama so the lady can support me/ Tried on some Jordans, then I walked out the store/ Once I asked the clerk to go down and look for some more/ Order bacon and grits when I sit in the diner/ And I ask the waitress to serve my dish on China/ The finer things in life are the things that I desire/ To live in harmony, you got to pay the piper/ I'm working every day now, sometimes nights/ Cause I got my sights on some property out in Niger/ Tonight I got my sights on a chick in a Tiger-skin mini/ Think she Trini, ooh mama would like her!/ Politely invite her out for a nightcap, at my place/ If she says yes, that's a great Saturday. Chorus The boss taking off early, want me to stay late/ Like my name Fred Flintstone, and he Mr. Slate/ Mr. Spacely to Jetson, Fred to Lamont/ He's an evil old man, can't believe this old man don't want me to punch out/ I got a hunchback, the Ricketts, and the gout/ And I can't get a lunch hour to pout?/ I can't fight the powers that be/ When they keep the shirt on my back and the shoes on my feet/ If I take a leap of faith in myself I might see/ If I gotta eat dirt or I can turn away meat/ I thought I had beef, but beef ain't with the boss/ Beef is what you cause when you ain't handling yours/ I'll be handling mines, you can find me on the grind/ Giving people respect, and little kids high fives...on a Saturday Chorus Verse 3--Spoken Word
8.
Chorus Is it Killer Instinct? Till the Nigger's Extinct? I heard the SOS coming from the lower decks/ A kidnapping, Africans in distress/ Ain't no place to rest on a slave ship/ That's the first page in the test of patience/ Back breaking labor awaits them in Macon/ That's if they ain't stationed in a cane field/ Rain, sleet, or snow they hoeing for the crop to keep growing/ They look pretty and all that, but no dough!/ You gotta whip, you gotta whip 'em/ Sprinkle salt, make it tickle/ Watch a nigger twitch! Chorus Little Dwayne cracks a joke in class/ And everybody laughs but his teacher/ Who said that was his last chance/ I'm gonna have to tell your parents/ Cause I simply can't stand for these types of shenanigans/ Little Dwayne is scared, cause Daddy don't spare the rod/ And he definitely don't tolerate tears/ He sits back quietly in the chair, for maybe Mr. Johnson would be fair/ Dwayne did behave for the rest of the day, but he went home late to his mother waiting for him/ And when Daddy came home, Daddy whupped his ass!/ Made him take his clothes off and beat him/ Beat him till he peed on himself/ It's slavery all over again/ Daddy becomes the overseer/ The one with all the money who can't spend no time/ But Daddy do all the beating/ Modern day teachers have become officers/ Enforcing the rules of society through textbooks, handouts/ Scantrons, Detentions, suspensions/ The Number 2 pencils that carve poison into our minds/ Making us remember lies year after year/ These schools are killing our children/ And we send them unarmed into an intellectual battlefield/ And we beat them when they come home with scars... Is it Killer Instinct?
9.
Chorus War and Peace Violence jumping off in the streets as we speak You best to warn police We coming for that ass, we gunning for that ass And the reason ain't peace, we ridin Best to pick a side, my nigga, to stay alive my nigga I ain't doing no more sit-ins to get shit on, it's corny/ And I know now I ain't gon' never fit in/ I ain't commit the first sin, but I'ma cast the first stone at the dawn of the morning/ Form a militia built of the same niggas in Compton that was picked to pick cotton in Virginia/ The epicenter of the NIGGER epidemic/ Right off the Atlantic, run and tell your parents/ They're caught up in it too if they're Caribou or Spanish/ Hanna Barbera, the Mein Fuhrer/ Hannibal or Jesse the Body Ventura/ Whoever the man in the mirror may be/ Can he see the possibility of peace/ The grim atrocity of grief/ Or at least feel the pain flowing through his own veins/ Shit change a man for the better or drive him insane/ Which way do you follow if you look ahead to tomorrow/ Do you see hope or ganja smoke and empty bottles?/ Living life in staccatto/ Fuck the world is your motto/ Fuck your girl till she hollow... Chorus I ain't signing no petitions, I don't want no fucking sympathy/ Just give me the chance to make my own decisions willingly/ Life is a riddle, I'm caught right in the middle passage/ Having a flashback of crackers giving me whip lashes/ No wonder the ratchet feel snug in my back pocket/ I carried a machete to pick cotton for years/ I forgot but the Dr. helped me swallow my fears/ Told him he should go to Columbine and work out there/ We all got the same problems, just the wrong idea/ Fuck peace, we on some eye for eye, ear for an ear/ Line of coke getting sniffed on the line for welfare/ The wine burns going down, cause it's hell here/ But let me ask, who in the hell cares if you fucked up/ When everybody got their own shoe straps to buckle up/ Cuddling and kissing's for actors and actresses/ Get to cussin and kicking, or get you ass in the kitchen/ Bake a pie in the oven/ Deliver it to your neighbor and try to learn how to love 'em... Chorus
10.
Shottas 02:42
Shottas bust fire, burn down the station/ That's because liars now run the nation/ In the final days, everyone will have to pay/ All that I can say, is I might get it right today/ The devil's in my shadow, the shark who bites the paddle/ I'm swimming, swimming, swimming trying to keep him off my ass!
11.
Spoken Word.

credits

released August 31, 2006

All songs written and produced by Mercury for 3 O Clock High Music except
"On the Move", produced by James Armstead Brown for PeacePipe Productions
"MarynMe" & "TCB", produced by K Rockwell for KRockwell Productions
All songs recorded and mixed by "Mercury" Harris at The Dugout except
"On the Move", recorded and mixed by James Armstead Brown at PeacePipe Studios
Cover Art and Photography by Alex Seel

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Mercury the Maroon New York, New York

Emcee. Producer. Engineer. Educator. Liberator of misguided spirits. Traffic director for his own lane. Fame and fortune deserter.
ALL MERCURY THE MAROON MUSIC IS NOW FREE TO THE PEOPLE. NAME YOUR PRICE OF $0! I AIN'T A DAMN FOOL THOUGH, SO IF YOU WANT TO PAY ME FOR MY SOUNDS, GO RIGHT AHEAD, BUT KNOW THAT I'M NOT CHARGING YOU.
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