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Button in this hustling, then, publicly, I'm Buddy Lee
There's no busting them
And cuffing them is like ushering in the regime Lupe Fiasco (Ft. JAY-Z) – Pressure
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“No Busting ‘Em” was the Lee Jeans slogan during its Buddy Lee campaign.

Lupe references “busting [a sag]”, or sagging, which is how a lot of people wear jeans. However, the use off the word cuffing that follows the word busting puts an image of an arrest in the listeners head.

Moreover, using the word cuffing, or cuffed, he plays off another style of wearing pants.

Just as Buddy Lee was the mascot for Lee Jeans, Lupe is a mascot for the hustlers. However, he won’t ever be busted and placed in handcuffs. If someone attempts to detain Lupe, it would cause chaos in the community.

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A little big in the waist, two-pocket on the back Lupe Fiasco (Ft. JAY-Z) – Pressure
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Referencing The Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac, Lupe furthers the pants metaphor seen throughout the first verse.

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my snorkel is a tuba
Lu the ruler around these seas
Westside Poseidon, Westside beside 'em Lupe Fiasco (Ft. GemStones & Graham Burris) – Dumb It Down
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Just as Poseidon is the king of the seas, Lupe is the king of the rap game and Chicago’s Westside. Seas/C’s (for Chicago) may be a double entendre.

Recall the earlier reference to Pegasus — Poseidon is Pegasus’s father (he sired him in his role as horse-god).

Snorkels help you breathe underwater. The rap game is the water and it takes a lot to survive it. Lupe says he can survive because his snorkel is as big as a tuba, the biggest instrument in the brass family.

Lupe is quite fond of the tuba, even describing it as the instrument he’d most like to play in “And He Gets the Girl”

This also the lowest pitched brass instrument which can be tied into the “excess depth” theme.

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78860d8be2c98fddc2212e9bbecf8a70

189

3 years

snorkel is his breathing (rap voice) and the water (his flow)

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7 years

Lupe is also an Aquarius for his own Zodiac sign. It symbolizes being “The water bearer of knowledge”. It’s fact that water is 2/3 of earth and more than 70% in our physical bodies.

There’s also fluid in your ear canal and sound does travel through it. This sends sonic signals to your auditory cortex (where all sounds are processed into your brain). He has ruled through even mythological means to send his messages through another medium.

That connects the “David Blaine, make it rain” bar as mythology is often regarded as supernatural tales of magic. His hyperbolic goes into purposeful epic proportions in this verse. He is making fun of how most rappers outlandish brag about the power they have over the masses, as if they’re deities.

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And so began our reign
The Trinity: Her and I, Caine Lupe Fiasco – The Coolest
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In Christian doctrine, “The Trinity” is comprised of God the Father (Jehovah), God the Son (Jesus Christ), and God the Holy Spirit.

Lupe’s “Holy Trinity” in his corrupt life with the Streets consists of:

  • Her (the Streets)

  • Himself

  • Cocaine (the Game)

This is also a pun on hurricanes and a carrying over of a theme from Verse 1. The hurricane pun ties the first line’s reign/rain theme into the second line.

Image of the “uncool” Trinity cycle:

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gene bressler
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2 years

Cain is most likely a biblical allusion to the story of Cain and Abel. Cain is born in god’s grace, but murders his brother Abel out of jealousy. That sort of sheer ego/envy/wrath is indicative of the “virtues” extoled by the personifications of the streets/game, tying the religious allegory back to the albums main themes

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boolin with the bible
4 years

another obvious reference in this line is the Genesis narrative of Cain and Abel, in which Cain murders his brother Abel after God rejects Cain’s offerings in favor of Abel’s. Cain is traditionally the human originator of violence, greed, and jealousy. Lupe’s trilogy retains its Biblical connection but flips it into something corrupt – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit :: The Streets, MYH, and Cain.

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6 years

Kane is a biblical reference for the killing of his brother (the streets)

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Cool Hand
7 years

co-caine:
definition co-:
1. Joint; mutual; common
2. Jointly; Mutually
3.together with another

The her and I form the co in cocaine.

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And if the rain stops, and everything's dry
She would cry just so I can drink the tears from her eyes Lupe Fiasco – The Coolest
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This continues the king/queen wordplay introduced a few lines earlier. The “rain/reign” homophone creates another man/nature duality. Rain also represents the money that seems to be flowing like rain.

He says “drink the tears from her eyes” because the character ‘The Streets’ is known to have tears made of Hennessy. “Dry” is street slang meaning there are no illegal drugs around, hence his “reign/rain” stopping. Moreover, the alcohol —Hennesy— is often consumed to deal with sorrows, an emotion that he would feel if his reign stopped.

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Paper, the likes of which that I had never seen
Her eyes glow green with the logo of our dreams
The purpose of our scene, an obscene obsession for the bling
She would be my queen, I could be her king, together
She would make me cool, and we would both rule, forever
And I would never feel pain
And never be without pleasure, ever again Lupe Fiasco – The Coolest
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This ‘logo of our dreams’ is a reference to the dollar sign. In “Real Recognize Real”, The Streets is described as a “demon in a dress/with dollar signs in her eyes and semen on her breath”.

The Streets can help MYH attain the wealthy status —and accumulation of paper— he desires, but not without consequences.

The idea of being with The Streets is supposed to make MYH “cool” in the eyes of the literal streets. As long as MYH is with her, he believes will get anything he wants.

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Writer of the white powder, picker of the fire flowers Lupe Fiasco (Ft. GemStones & Graham Burris) – Dumb It Down
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Lupe’s music is addictive like cocaine. And of course cocaine and rap lyrics both come in “lines”. “Fire flower” is a nickname given to the poppies used in making heroin. In addition, good weed (just like good rap) can be referred to as “fire.”

Moreover, this is a Mario reference. When Mario picks/eats/runs into/whatever the fire flowers, he gets all shiny and is able to shoot fire at enemies. Lupe is a rapping beast of similar power.

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Something really stinks, but I Sphinx like Leon
Or lion in the desert Lupe Fiasco (Ft. GemStones & Graham Burris) – Dumb It Down
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Lupe keeps his inscrutable cool, like the Spinxes:

  • Leon Spinks, the boxer who took away Muhammad Ali’s championship title

  • The Sphinx of Giza

The Sphinx is a “lion” in the desert, which also “lies” in the desert (it is sculpted in a recumbent pose).

This is a brilliant transition because the name “Leon” comes from the Greek/Latin word for lion, “leo”, which is “leon” in Spanish and “lion” in French.

As for the reference to smell, note that the Sphinx is missing its nose, while Leon Spinks had his nose broken by Muhammad Ali.

The Sphinx’s missing nose foreshadows the damage that cocaine can inflict on heavy users, as suggested in the next five bars.

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6ba605426f04e1b163571e1f72f9450e

192

1 year

Corny and inconsistent

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6ba605426f04e1b163571e1f72f9450e

192

1 year

Weak bar. Your nose doesn’t fall when your nose is broke.

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V8k1nr3irduduychabch

3,639

11 years

Another very interesting aspect to Lupe’s sphinx allusion is the sphinx’s role in Greek mythology. It would pose a riddle to all travellers looking to enter the city of Thebes: “Which creature walks on four legs in the morning, two legs in the afternoon, and three legs in the evening?”. The sphinx would then eat all those who could not solve the riddle. The sphinx symbolizes Lupe’s superior lyrical ability and his disdain for less intelligent flows.

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Default_avatar_100

20

11 years

He is saying something stinks, meaning bad rap. But he “cant smell it”, meaning he ignores or separates himself form it. A noseless thing “cant smell”.

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I'm flying on Pegasus, you're flying on a pheasant Lupe Fiasco (Ft. GemStones & Graham Burris) – Dumb It Down
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As a rapper, Lupe metaphorically flies on Pegasus, who was a winged horse sired by Poseidon in his role as a horse-god. This is a reference to Greek mythology, which recalls the Sphinx of the previous line.

Other rappers are pheasants; they don’t fly well and prefer to run on the ground.

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Jakey
9 years

Pegasus and Leon are also both constellations, which ties into the “to infinity and beyond” line. Thus, he’s flying in the stars while the other rappers are in the forest floor.

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Make a song for the bitches, nigga! (Dumb it down!)
We don't care about the weather nigga (Dumb it down!) Lupe Fiasco (Ft. GemStones & Graham Burris) – Dumb It Down
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A reference to Lupe’s song, “Sunshine” from his debut album Lupe Fiasco’s Food & Liquor. The song is another filled with complexity, as the girl mentioned throughout the song is used as a metaphor for Hip-Hop as a whole.

Lupe doesn’t follow the typical rap trope of making songs for women, and when he does, they’re not as simple as they may seem on the surface.

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Ben
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8 years

It also could mean that people who listen to Lupe don’t want to here about controversial terminology and philosophy about the world (weather).

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B460b93f6aaf90b8df05d73c05476d08

7,438

10 years

“Make a song for the bitches, nigga” is a reference to Sunshine. Gemini is saying that he should make music for promiscuous women instead of respectable ones.

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