Triumph Lyrics

[Verse 2: Method Man]
As the world turns, I spread like germ
Bless the globe with the pestilence, the hard-headed never learn

This my testament to those burned
Play my position in the game of life, standing firm
On foreign land, jump the gun out the frying pan
Into the fire, transform into the Ghost Rider

A six-pack and A Streetcar Named Desire
Who got my back? In the line of fire, holding back
What? My peoples; if you with me, where the fuck you at?
Niggas is strapped and they tryna twist my beer cap
It's court adjourned for the bad seed from bad sperm
Herb got my wig fried like a bad perm
What the blood clot? We smoke pot, and blow spots
You wanna think twice? I think not
The Iron Lung ain't got to tell you where it's coming from
Guns of Navarone tearing up your battle zone
Rip through your slums


[Verse 3: Cappadonna]
I twist darts from the heart, tried and true
Loop my voice on the LP

Martini on the slang rocks, certified chatterbox
Vocabulary 'Donna talking, tell your story walking
Take cover, kid, what? Run for your brother, kid
Run for your team and your "six can't rhyme" groupies
So I can squeeze with the advantage and get wasted
My deadly notes reign supreme
Your thought is basic compared to mine
Domino effect, arts and crafts, paragraphs contain cyanide
Take a free ride on my thought
I got the fashion catalogs for all y'all to all praise due to God
[Interlude: Ol' Dirty Bastard]
The saga continues
Wu-Tang, Wu-Tang


[Verse 4: U-God]
Olympic torch flaming, we burn so sweet
The thrill of victory, the agony of defeat
We crush slow, flaming deluxe slow for
Judgment Day cometh, conquer, it's war
Allow us to escape Hell, globe spinning bomb
Pocket full of shells out the sky Golden Arms
Tunes spit the shitty Mortal Kombat sound
The fake false step make the blood stain the ground
A jungle junkie, vigilante tantrum
A death kiss catwalk, squeeze another anthem
Hold it for ransom, tranquilized with anesthesias
My orchestra, graceful, music ballerinas
My music Sicily, rich California smell
An axe kill adventure, paint a picture well
I sing a song from Sing Sing, sipping on ginseng
Righteous wax chaperon, rotating ring kings

[Verse 5: RZA]
March of the wooden soldiers, C-Cypher-Punks couldn't hold us
A thousand men rushing in, not one nigga was sober
Perpendicular to the square, we stand gold like Flair
Escape from your dragon's lair
In particular, my beats travel like a vortex
Through your spine to the top of your cerebral cortex
Make you feel like you bust a nut from raw sex
Enter through your right ventricle clog up your bloodstream
Heart terminal like Grand Central Station
Program fat bass lines on Novation
Getting drunk like I'm fucking ducking five-year probation
[Verse 6: GZA]
War of the masses, the outcome disastrous
Many of the victim families save their ashes

A million names on walls, engraved in plaques
Those who went back received penalties for the acts
Another heart is torn as close ones mourn'
Those who stray, niggas get slayed on the song

[Verse 7: Masta Killa]
The track renders helpless and suffers from multiple stab wounds
And leaks sounds that's heard
93 million miles away from
Came one to represent the Nation
This is a gathering of the masses
That come to pay respects to the Wu-Tang Clan
As we engage in battle, the crowd now screams in rage

The high chief Jamel Irief takes the stage
Light is provided through sparks of energy
From the mind that travels in rhyme form
Giving sight to the blind

The dumb are mostly intrigued by the drum
Death only one can save self from
This relentless attack of the track spares none

[Verse 8: Ghostface Killah]
Yo, yo, yo, fuck that!
Look at all these crab niggas laid back

Lamping like them gray and black Puma's on my man's rack
Codeine was forced in your drink
You had a navy green salamander fiend
Bitches overheard you scream
You two-faces, scum of the slum, I got your whole body numb
Blowing like Shalamar in '81
Sound convincing, thousand dollar cork-pop convention
Hands like Sonny Liston, get fly permission
Hold the fuck up, I'll unfasten your wig, bad luck
I humiliate, separate the English from the Dutch
It's me, black Noble Drew Ali, came in threes
We like the Genovese, sazon season these degrees

It's Earth, 93 million miles from the first
Rough turbulence, the wave burst, split the megahertz

[Verse 9: Raekwon]
A-yo, that's amazing
Gun in your mouth talk, verbal foul hawk
Connect thoughts to make my man child walk
Swift notarizer, Blue-Tang, all up in the high-riser
New York Yank visor, word tranquilizer
Adjust the dosage, delegate my Clan with explosives

While my pen blow lines ferocious
Mediterranean, see y'all, the number one draft pick
Tear down the beat, God, then delegate the God to see God
The swift chancellor, flex the white gold tarantula
Track truck diesel, play the weed God substantiala
Max mostly, undivided then slide in sickening
Guaranteed made 'em jump like Rod Strickland

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About

Genius Annotation

An epic posse cut featuring all nine members of the Wu-Tang Clan (plus Cappadonna), from their second album Wu-Tang Forever.

“Triumph” was the first single, and along with its classic video, established Wu-Tang as a force in mainstream rap as well as the underground world, while maintaining the dark street sound they introduced on 36 Chambers.

Q&A

Find answers to frequently asked questions about the song and explore its deeper meaning

What has Method Man said about the song?
Genius Answer

Meth told Complex

It was a lot of energy in the room when we did ‘Triumph.’ We did it at Ray Parker Jr.’s studio. I remember we had two studios in there, so some dudes would be over here doing this and some dudes would be over there doing that. But in the beginning, we were all in one studio doing ‘Triumph.’

Deck went first, killed it. I went in and did my verse. It was the same order [as recording ‘Protect Ya Neck’]. Nobody was moved around. As far as Ol’ Dirty goes, once we hit Cali you couldn’t find that nigga. When we got him in the studio, we tried to throw him in as much shit as we could.

Dirty, he was the motherfucking star. He was able to handle all the cameras and all that, he was ready for all that shit. Not saying that I wasn’t, I enjoyed what I did. I wasn’t walking around uncomfortable all the time.

‘Triumph’ was like, all the pressure of the name being bigger than the group and everybody smelling themselves and thinking they were bigger than they really was. You can hear all that on ‘Triumph.’ By the middle of the album, focus was being lost.

I’m speaking for myself, not my crew. My focus was lost by the middle of the album and my heart just wasn’t in it like it used to be. I don’t regret anything that I did, but I wish I would’ve been a little more focused on the shit that really mattered at that point in time.

I started feeling uncomfortable around the cameras. I started feeling uncomfortable around crowds and in party atmospheres. I just didn’t like it. You can get a moment of clarity when you’re at your highest point—when you’re fucked up and you high and something hits you like an epiphany. My epiphany was seeing all these motherfuckers doing the same thing every night in every club and in every video.

It became like, ‘What the fuck is this frivolous bullshit?’ It’s like going in the club and knowing what somebody answer is gonna be when you say, ‘What’s up my G?—‘Everything is all good’ or ‘It ain’t nothing to a playa.’ I did not want to be a part of that shit no more.

All I was talking about was smoke this, party that, and all this shit. Is that really what this shit is about? I’m not really about that shit. I want to do something different. I don’t want to conform and be the same like the rest of these motherfuckers.

What did Wu-Tang Clan say about "Triumph"?
Genius Answer

RZA talked about the creation of this beat in a recent AMA session on Reddit:

I started creating it in New York. And didn’t finish it until sometime in California. It was one of the first times that I combined three different beat machines together.

What have people said about the video for this song?
Genius Answer

The “Triumph” music video is one of the most well known in hip hop. In the six minute epic, a “killa bee” swarm wreaks havoc across New York, including the Wu’s very own Shaolin Island. From Ol’ Dirty jumping from a building to Masta Killa standing on an obelisk to Ghostface and Raekwon rapping in a cage, it displays the group’s diversity and appeal to a cartoonish aesthetic.

A goliath of pop culture references are made throughout the hysterical montage. Inspectah Deck imitates Spiderman. Method Man’s Johnny Blaze persona is a homage to the “Ghost Rider” version. RZA helps Alcatraz inmates escape. During GZA’s verse, a clip from “The Birth Of A Nation” is shown (correlating this line and the film’s glorification of the Ku Kluxx Klan).

Above: a still from “Triumph” of the posse cut rapping inside a massive beehive.


Director Brett Ratner discussed its background in a 2009 Complex interview:

It was the first million dollar rap video.* When Steve Rifkind asked me, I said, ‘Are you sure about this record? There’s no chorus!’ He says “Trust me, its gonna be the biggest record of the year. Only Wu-Tang could pull this off.‘ So, I set up the video — Joseph Kahn was my cinematographer.

It’s a five day shoot, and it’s crazy. The greatest fuckin' experience, they’re eating mushrooms the whole time. Ol' Dirty never shows up. I was like, Oh my god, this is fucking insane! The most fun I ever had.

*Deck claimed in a 2015 interview that the videos for Biggie’s “Hypnotize” and Shaquille O'Neal’s “Biological Didn’t Bother” had achieved this feat first. A year later, Puff Daddy’s “Victory” video would budget at almost $4 million.

Credits
Featuring
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Video Director
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Phonographic Copyright ℗
Performance Rights
Mastering Engineer
Recording Engineer
Mixing Engineer
Recorded At
36 Chambers Studio (New York City)
Release Date
February 11, 1997
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