Genius | Song Lyrics & Knowledge

Coach sat me down from the ball team (Uh)
'Cause I was breakin' niggas on the inseams (Word, word) A Tribe Called Quest – 8 Million Stories

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It’s like he’s going past his opponents by dribbling the ball between their legs. it’s an easy way to lose the ball, hence his coach being furious. He uses the term “breaking” as in “ankle-breaker”, when you go past the opposite player in such a fashion that you move the ball in order to throw him out of balance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPpOxPlCTEs

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Rap ain't about bustin caps and fuckin bitches
It's about fluency with rhymin ingenuity Hieroglyphics (Ft. Del the Funky Homosapien) – At the Helm

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Hip hop isn’t about being “thug” or “g”, it’s about skillfully and fluently creating rhymes.

Easily the best line on the entire album and quite possibly one of the most insightful stanzas in hip-hop history.

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Invade your zone, ruin like Ancient Rome Gang Starr (Ft. Inspectah Deck) – Above the Clouds

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Inspectah Deck references the Christian and Five Percenter belief that the Fall of Rome was a justified punishment for Rome’s moral wickedness and decadence.

Also, this could simply mean that he (Deck) will take over the fans and leave careers of wack rappers in ruins, just like ancient Rome did to other villages.

Once again, Deck gives us the historical/spiritual reference as well as the ghetto style proverb.

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He pushed up on the block and made the dope sales drop
Like the crash in the Dow Jones stock GZA (Ft. Method Man) – Gold

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He begins the personification of record deals & sales as drug deals. Here, he has it out for dealers who’ve moved in on his turf and made his product not sell as well. Almost as if they tried to gain territory and started a drug war.

One of the dopest flows on the record, dope sales are droppin like the stock market’s crashin.

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6,620

9 years

law of supply and demand. when there is more supply from other dealers GZA is losing money so he’s gotta blast em. Should have diversified his bonds instead of relying on drug money

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There's a feeling I get when I look to the West
And my spirit is crying for leaving Led Zeppelin – Stairway to Heaven

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Since the sun sets in the West, the narrator may be trying to describe the feelings he gets when he thinks about death. This man’s soul is looking to the West, longingly, hoping to leave this earth.

Also, given Led Zeppelin’s fondness of Lord of the Rings references, it may likely be an allusion to the idea of “The West,” the Undying Lands, of Middle Earth presented in Tolkien’s mythology. In general the Elves go there to live out eternity in peace with friends and family, a thinly veiled concept of heaven.

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415

2 years

This may also be a reference to “The West” as in the western culture. The song begins with the story of a lady that is so materialistic she thinks she can get to heaven through her materialism. This verse could double as criticism for the growing decadence of Western culture and western capitalism.

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3 years

Perhaps Plant is playing, as others have pointed out, about how the west is considered the bastion of opportunity. Maybe he’s implying that implication is empty or false? That we’ve been sold a lie? Why go west when there other directions to go?

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4 years

This could also be a reference to Plant himself, perhaps describing past feelings, as he harboured a life long love and fascination for Wales and the Welsh culture, and from his home of Birmingham, Wales was to the West. Plant felt as if he was trapped in a revolving cycle in his hometown amidst all the industry and factory surrounding him, and that residing in welsh mountains provided him with a sense of belonging and purpose in the world. He has said in the past that from childhood he longed to live in the high Welsh valleys, hence his ‘spirit crying for leaving’. His love for Wales was a recurring topic in the Zeppelin days and beyond, for example Bron-Y-Aur and his segment of the Zeppelin movie ‘The Song Remains The Same’ – in which he appears upon a horse with a sword and a fantastic fur cloak in the welsh hillside.

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2,769

5 years

“Going west” is a metaphor that goes way back in American folklore. In much Native belief, the spirit journeys west after death. Throughout the 19th century, the West represented the land of opportunity (“Go west, young man!”). It popped up in early rock ballads like “California Dreaming” and “Route 66”. Here the spirit could be crying to leave earthly life or leave for a better opportunity elsewhere. Either way “the west” stands in for the destination.

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5 years

Maybe he just sees the west as a journey destination. But not for death.. Maybe for travelling, living or whatever. Maybe he has been there before and wants back to the nice old golden time… Or maybe because the west is very wealthy and the girl must be from this wealthy place, so he can meet her there.
So many interpretations are possible

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