1987 Lyrics

Acid-wash Guess with the leather patches
Sportin' the white Diadoras with the hoodie that matches
I'm wearing two Swatches and a small Gucci pouch
I could have worn the Lugi but I left it in the house

Now, my niggas Duce and Wayne got gold plates with their names
With the skyline on it with the box link chain

I'm wearing my frames
They match my gear with their tint

And you know Lagerfeld is the scent

Now, my nigga Rafael just got his jeep out the shop
Mint green sidekick, custom-made rag top
"Strictly Business" is the album that we play
"You're A Customer"; the pick of the day

Now there's a nigga on the block, never seen him before
Selling incence and oil, my man thinks that he's the law
But why on earth would this be on their agenda?
As he slowly approaches the window..

"Uh, uh, I've seen you before, I've been you and more

I was the one bearing the pitcher of water
I rent the large upper room
Furnished with tidings of your doom
Or pleasure, whichever feathers decree."
Yo Ralph is he talking to me?
"No I'm talking to the sea son's resurrected
I'm the solstice of the day
I bring news from the blues of the Caspian"
My man laughs, he's one them crazy motherfuckers
Turn the music back up - cause I'm the E-Double'
"Wait, but but but but I know the volume of the sea
And sound waves as I will

Will you allow me to be at your service?"
My man Ralph is nervous. He believes
That this strange tongue deceives
And maybe he's been informed that
He's pushing gats hidden in the back, beneath the floor mats
Come on Jack, we don't have time
For your bullshit or playin
A'salaam a something' or another

"Wait isn't Juanita your mother?
I told you I know you, now grant me a moment"

Man that shit was wild you should have seen how they ran
She woke up in an alley with a gun in her hand
2Pac in lotus form
Ennis' blood on his hands

She woke up on a vessel
The land behind her
The sun within her
Water beneath her
Mushed corn for dinner
Or was it breakfast
Her stomach turned as if a compass
She prayed towards east and lay there breathless

They threw her overboard for dead
She swam silently and fled
Into the blue sea

La soh fa mi, re do, si
The seventh octave
I don't mean to confuse you
Many of us have been taught to sing
And so we practice scales
Many of us were born singing
And thus were born with scales
Mermaids, cooks, and fieldhands
Sang a nightsong by the forest

And the ocean was the chorus
In Atlantis where they sang
Those thrown overboard had overheard
The mystery of the undertow
And understood that down below
There would be no more chains

They surrendered breath and name
And survived countless as rain
I'm the weather man
The clouds say storm is coming
A white buffalo is born
Already running
And if you listen very close
You'll hear a humming

Beneath the surface of our purpose lies
Rumors of ancient man
Dressed in cloud face minstrels in the sky
The moon's my mammy
The storm holds my eye
Dressed in westerlies
Robed by Robeson ol' man river knows my name
And the reason you were born
Is the reason
That I came
Then she looks me in the face
And her eyes get weak
Pulse rate descends, hearts rate increase
Emcees look me in the face and their eyes get weak
Pulse rates descends hearts rate increase
[x2]
It's like "beam me up, Scottie", I control your body
I'm as deadly as AIDS when it's time to rock a party

We all rocked fades, fresh faded in ladi dadi

And when we rock the mic...
And when we rock the mic...
And when we rock the mic...


But let the feminine side ignore the feminine side
Let the feminine side ignore the feminine side
Let the feminine side ignore the feminine side
Let the feminine side...

I presented my feminine side with flowers
She cut the stems and placed them gently down my throat
And these two lips might soon eclipse your brightest hopes

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About

Genius Annotation

1987 is a song in which the narrator, a young black man, meets a street vendor who appears to have knowledge of the narrator’s past and describes the struggles, sacrifices, and losses of enslaved African peoples, including particularly vivid descriptions of the middle passage. In this way, 1987 might be understood as an exploration of what Walter Benjamin described as the “weak messianic power”. Benjamin, in his third thesis on the concept of history writes:

“The past carries a secret index with it, by which it is referred to its resurrection. Are we not touched by the same breath of air which was among that which came before? is there not an echo of those who have been silenced in the voices to which we lend our ears today? have not the women, who we court, sisters who they do not recognize anymore? If so, then there is a secret protocol [Verabredung: also appointment] between the generations of the past and that of our own. For we have been expected upon this earth. For it has been given us to know, just like every generation before us, a weak messianic power, on which the past has a claim. This claim is not to be settled lightly. The historical materialist knows why.”

https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/benjamin/1940/history.htm

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Credits
Written By
Release Date
October 23, 2001
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