America - La Coka Nostra, Ill Bill, Slaine

Inequality is really unprecedented

Talking about the American dream, it’s all collapsed

There was an expectation that things were gonna get better

There isn’t today

Half-grinned dotty eyes, shadowed by his hat brims

Stocks press red line, shotty in the black Benz

Five fetched headlines, followed by a rap fiend

Red blood dripping in a black sink

Bottom line back end, money in a fat link

Gold chain, full drinks spilling on his linens with the cocaine

Women on his tip, made the models nervous

Putting waitresses through college with the bottle service

The kind of drug dealer’s dreams you can follow furthest

Using yesterday’s bullets for tomorrow’s murders

Laughing with the passion with the masterminds, just to pass the time

Raise a glass of wine for the working man, he’s asinine

The craft of crime, blue collar tradition

The high class or the two dollar edition

All salute to the man sipping cold whiskey

Where pursuit of the gold could be so risky

Once upon a time in America

We were told that the roads would be paved with gold

But when the well’s done drained and the shells come flying

Go to church but it still won’t save your soul

Once upon a time in America

We were told that the roads would be paved with gold

But when the blocks get shot up while the cops sweat product

Go to church but it still won’t save your soul

My whole circle is large, barbarians with surgical scars

Send you vertical to the stars while avoiding the murder charge

Blow your brains like Kennedy in convertible cars

We stay trapped on the block like cows herded on farms

Heard the alarm, then my brain froze

I’m marked with plain clothes

Hopping out and popping my peoples, giving em halos

The beast feast on fear and power and greed

Powder the weed, planting weapons where the innocent bleed

The ignorant breed descended wicked sons with guns

To shoot first, then interrogate with bloods in my lungs

I swear to Jesus the police are the fiendish serving to Satan

A serpent’s forsaken the searches they nervously shaking

The shots shatter sound matter, body splatters and drops

Scatter the block, ain’t a predator deadlier than the cop

Nightsticks leaving sticky blood stains on my white kicks

For slinging that white, bitch, I stay on the night shift

Once upon a time in America

We were told that the roads would be paved with gold

But when the well’s done drained and the shells come flying

Go to church but it still won’t save your soul

Once upon a time in America

We were told that the roads would be paved with gold

But when the blocks get shot up while the cops sweat product

Go to church but it still won’t save your soul

Went from blocks in the sandbox to rocks on my man’s block

The only threat, these fag cops

Kept it moving like black ops

Used to be park bench philosophers

The forty ounce bottle mafia, now we sipping wine with tilapia

Whether from Crooklyn or Compton, turn your problems to options

Fuck devils, demons and monsters, American dreaming, constant

Building schemes up to profit, built to defeat the nonsense

Either kill em with kindness or pop them and drop them in a ditch

On to the next endeavor, we investing forever

But tomorrow’s a lifetime away from this very second

And it only takes a second to fire a gun

Another second to die young

Is this the American dream or a nightmare?

Is life fair?

I don’t know but I’ll be right there

With ya if they try to hit ya, standing back-to-back with pistols in the picture

Eight million stories like the riddles in the scripture

Once upon a time in America

We were told that the roads would be paved with gold

But when the well’s done drained and the shells come flying

Go to church but it still won’t save your soul

Once upon a time in America

We were told that the roads would be paved with gold

But when the blocks get shot up while the cops sweat product

Go to church but it still won’t save your soul