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1. |
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VERSE 1
Don’t be shy
I already like you
Don’t care what you drive
I’m attracted to the IQ
Not my style to make the first move
Haven’t felt this type of way since maybe high school
Sealed with a kiss
Signed with an Epipen,
You gotta tolerate some risk
If you wanna make a margin, wanna make a friend
We could live a little larger
Split the dividends
HOOK 1
Wheels up
Let’s go
Already missed too much
To take this thing too slow
I already like you
There’s no sure bet
You just ride, ride, ride roulette
And I like you
I already like you
HOOK 2
It feels right
Because it’s true
Don’t have to try when
I’m with you
You’re not the type to bend a rule
But I’m your bullet
And the proof
VERSE 2
This city can feel like a little town
Think a marathon’s on, way they’re running all their mouths
But let em talk,
Let em wear their selves out
My book stays open
I know ‘cause I wrote it
Fucked up the trust fall
Caught a concussion
Run it off, that ain’t nothing
But the cost
The cost of doing business
And I can take a hit with the big kids
Back up off me and count your own fingers
[BREAK]
Wheels up
Let’s go
I could be your bullet and the proof
Bullet and the proof
I already
I already like you
HOOK 1
Wheels up
Let’s go
Already missed too much
To take this thing too slow
I already like you
There’s no sure bet
You just ride, ride, ride roulette
I already
I already like you
HOOK 2
It feels right
Because it’s true
Don’t have to try when
I’m with you
You’re not the type to bend a rule
But I’m your bullet
And the proof
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2. |
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Verse 1
Ever since I was a little predator
Mom’s like, don’t get ahead of her
I was on the hunt for something better than the regular
And I knew there was candy at the register
So not about to settle for the vegetables.
Full grown, still got a sweet tooth
still tryna climb all the walls I can see, you
take your influences wichoo,
everywhere you go.
Mine were Carmen Sandiego
Lauryn Hill and Terry Gross.
But I’ve been playing hard to keep:
Kiss and teleport
Dark roots where the bleach won’t reach
Man, that’s gotta be a metaphor
But I’m still tryna storyboard it
Call me back if it’s important
If you’re looking for me
On this Tinder shit about partners in crime
Seems like Bonnie’s working little harder than Clyde
When it comes to the heist, doesn’t feel like a partnership
Cuz my accomplice is completely incompetent.
Nonsense 1
(Twizzlers)
Verse 2
Two bars walk into a joke.
First is a gold bar, other is soap.
Yo, lemme get the punchline I’m worth most
Gold says with a glass too full to toast
But Soap makes her voice go real low
Leans close
Rarely one to go boast
But when the banks hit the button, the credit goes down to nothing,
And the flood waters come in, then let’s see who floats.
Watch for unintended consequences—those you don’t see
The initials of your girlfriend could kill the fucking oak tree.
Nothing in my pocket but the body heat
Travel light, and mind your manners, man
That’s my foreign policy.
I’m that Netflix chick,
See the pieces on the ceiling—
The strategy above me
All the moves when I’m competing:
I’ll arrive by lightning bolt
Leave by cannonball
The china’s fine, man
The bull’s mechanical
Nonsense 2
(Robots)
Outro
A base hit is the son of a pitch
A tanning bed is the sun of the rich.
Son, keep your knuckles up, front of the fists
Don’t go broke, looking for something to fix
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3. |
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Champagne
Fake name
Number on a napkin
Check please
Room key
More coke for the captain
Lipstick on the filter
Sign out on the door
Seven hours til turndown services
On the second floor
Knock knock
Ten o’clock
Housekeeping with breakfast
Awe shock
Coffee hot
Airborne in the French press
Facedown on the bedspread
Color nearly half dead
Still recognizable as a
Regular guest
Missing wallet
Missing watch
Something in his tumbler probably stronger than the double scotch
Dizzy talk with
Busy cops
But no mention in the paperwork of the stash cost, the cash losses
No prints
Only hint
Blonde wig in the bathtub
APB on radio, state patrol on the back up
Nothing on the register
No plates on the rental car
Needle in the hay, girl like a shadow in the dark
But nine miles away
In the bathroom at a Texaco
Color contact lenses, freehand freckles, money in the pantyhose
Ten minutes from SFO
Cop at the counter with a photo of a brown-eyed girl in different clothes
Cash fare
Ride share
Taxi to the airport
Gate 5
On time
Baggage just a Jansport
Business class so rum and cola
Guiltless sleep til Mexico then
On the beach like any other rich resorter’s doctor’s orders
HOOK [SIREN CHOIR]
No talking business
VERSE 3
Room service
Evening paper and a mai tai
English version
Color picture, two-inch headline:
Jane Doe versus Kingpin
Drama at a local hotel
Suspect in the wind
Drug money missing as much as half a million
Likely inside job—just too much intel for civilians bills in
A backpack
Untrackable all cash
Flight risk highly likely
Solo female on the lam
Back at the residence
Bedtime for the Kingpin kids
Mommy on the tuck-in shift
Lights out now goodnight kisses
White lie for little princes:
Daddy on a business trip
Then frantic phone calls to the lawyers: asset shelters, audit risks.
HOOK [SIREN CHOIR]
No talking business
VERSE 4
No call
No show
Nanny girl still MIA
Slow drawl
Plain clothes
But never ever out a day
Mommy at the changing station
Weak knees with the revelation
Teddy on the top shelf: stuffing out decapitation
Lens in its belly gone
Day and night always ON
Disemboweled nanny cam
Now nanny with the upperhand.
Unforced error
Silly Daddy such a fool
Barely there but still this fumbling with the household golden rule
HOOK [SIREN CHOIR]
No talking business
No talking business
In the baby’s room.
No talking business
No talking business
In the baby’s room.
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4. |
LYTP
03:10
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VERSE 1
Running water
Standing wave
I’m looking at what must be your pet hurricane
Got you so spun
No break from the rain
Her roof held off your floor by just a trembling windowpane
Maybe that ringing in your ears
Is just her bell around your neck
And with a smoke ring on her finger
She goes and signals for the check
Dolce & Gabanna
Sodom and Gomorrah
Broken link in bio
Can’t tell the hunger from the boredom anymore
CHORUS
It looks like she loved you to pieces
Seems she’s been having the time of your life.
It looks like she loved you to pieces
But time
Is on nobody’s side
VERSE 2
Her double take
And single give
She’s out of pocket
Running numbers—not my business
But I can see how broke you’re going
Every time I visit
This life of yours passing just-just as fast as she can live it
Dolce & Gabanna
Sodom and Gomorrah
Broken link in bio
Can’t tell the hunger from the boredom anymore
BRIDGE
You can’t save your youth
For later, so
Take all you that you can carry and
Time is on nobody’s side
CHORUS
It looks like she loved you to pieces
Seems she’s been having the time of your life.
It looks like she loved you to pieces
But time
Is on nobody’s side
OUTRO CHORUS
It’s not too late
Til you say it is
Kingdoms come, kingdoms go
You don’t have to be brave
To lift your face to this
I’ll be your yes among no’s
It’s not too late,
Til you say it is
I’ll be your yes among no’s
Kingdoms come, kingdoms go
You don’t have to be brave
To lift your face to this
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5. |
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LYRICS:
Take your fronts out
If you’re talking to me
No VIP says VIP
I’ve known powerful women
And beautiful men,
And none of em calling for bottle service settle down and settle in
Mind your manners make a friend
Motherfucker
Where you been? How you living? Have a drink.
It’s cash only
But the staff knows me
Tell em it’s the girl in the back
Tab’s open.
CHORUS 1
When in Rome
You live by Roman code
It used to be
If don’t like it, you could leave
But then the walls came down
And so it’s all Rome now.
VERSE 2 (16 BAR)
You want a standing desk
You get floating grave
They say pound of flesh
Ah, but then it’s metric--wait
Hold up
Tryna get the glow up
Hope the bitcoin flip before the code rusts
Middle class: the poor man’s poor man
Disappoint the kids, bringing home the store brand
Whole life with a stone against your shoulder
Tryna flip the symbol over
Get it equal to or more than
Chekhov says you got a gun, you gotta use it.
Guess they’re reading Chekhov downtown, in their cruisers
Bang—catch the case we all lose
Make Dixie look like Khartoum
That Lady Justice ain’t blind yet
Lens cap on the body cam – missed again, damn
Make you wait
While they run your name and
St. Peter at the gate
Says, tuck your chain in.
CHORUS 2
When in Rome
You live by Roman code
It used to be
If don’t like it, you could leave
But then the walls came down
And so it’s all Rome now.
VERSE 3
It was the golden age before the firewall blew
Pictures pretty and the products all new
But then the data got bigger than the beta test who
‘da thought, after all, looks like the wire wore you.
And I think beauty fucks us up
It’s like sugar—in the natural world, we’d never get this much
So the appetite is bottomless
Call Maybelline Anonymous
Make narcissists of all of us
We never get enough.
It’s two-bit feminism
Only says you’re better than
Some other bitch--
That’s digging the same ditch
One of us winning don’t fix the damn system
Toes out, girls, back to second position
The natural order is value neutral
Culture institutes a few virtues
Capital comes and brings moral confusion
But do anything long enough
And the body gets used to it
CHORUS 3 (x2)
When in Rome
You live by Roman code
It used to be
If don’t like it, you could leave
But then the walls came down
And so it’s all Rome now.
When in Rome
You live by Roman code (Here in Rome)
It used to be
If don’t like it, you could leave
But then the walls came down
And so it’s all Rome now.
When in Rome
(Here in Rome)
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6. |
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Bombs away
On belay
I repel
Heard the call
Of the falls
And I fell
Threw my voice in the noise
Threw myself with the coin
If this thing works
I’ll land first
live to tell
Look what my future’s gone and done
Couldn’t get the car keys off her
took the money and run
But time will retrieve me
Wouldn’t leave me here in space out of reach
With no signs and no reasons
To hold myself in place.
But time can make the future settle
will stand us back to back
can melt us back together
fuse to the future to the past.
Bombs away
On belay
I repel
Heard the call
Of the falls
And I fell
Threw my voice in the noise
Threw myself with the coin
If this thing works
I’ll land first
live to tell
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7. |
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VERSE 1
Flip a coin, flip a car
I don’t care where we are
The picture and the sound won’t synch
And some things time can’t fix
I’m built for nights like this
Don’t mean I’m proud of it
And the rose in my teeth
Was a pin so it seems
You pull it and brace to blast
Get ready for the bang and flash
Alright just one last dance
make it fast
Prechorus
I know
How the tide pulls deep
Eyes open
But the mind’s asleep
Flash frozen
In the driver’s seat
Lights and motion
But they’re lost on me.
VERSE 2
There’s a dozen selves inside you
Tryna be the one to run the dials
And some aren’t even on your side
When the hunger comes and finds you,
only code it knows is rote survival
you’ll do the rest in your spare time
Tryna get that universal feeling
in an invite-only private room
guess the ring came off in the glove
Looks like you pawned the silver lining
Around the cloud that follows you
Guess that good old push came to shove
Prechorus
I know
How the tide pulls deep
Eyes open
But the mind’s asleep
Flash frozen
In the driver’s seat
Lights and motion
But they’re lost on me.
HOOK 1
Out in the water
You can’t touch bottom
It pulls you farther
Life on land forgotten
Verse 3
-4 bar instrumental-
The world rolls over
I’m pulled under
Stone cold sober,
But I feel nothing.
Bridge
I’m just a girl
In the body of a boy
In the belly of a whale
You can’t be sure
This far from shore
Which winds prevail
Prechorus
I know
How the tide pulls deep
Eyes open
But the mind’s asleep
Flash frozen
In the driver’s seat
Lights and motion
But they’re lost on me.
HOOK 2 (double)
OUTRO
Flip a coin, flip a car
I don’t care where we are
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8. |
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Dessa Minneapolis
Dessa is a writer and touring musician based in Manhattan and Minneapolis. Quick wit, sharp pen, soft heart.
Dessa recommends:
Pursuit & The Elusive
by Lady Midnight
Powerful vocals, ace production (hat tip to Lazerbeak), and a tracklist that demands movement. Lady Midnight is a force.
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