Roots Manuva

Rodney Hylton Smith, better known by his stage name Roots Manuva, is a British rapper from Stockwell, South London.

He is currently signed to Big Dada, an independent record label distributed by Ninja Tune. It was started by reputed hip hop journalist Will Ashon in 1997.

•→http://genius.com/search?q=roots+manuva⇐

∇   ‘The Falling’  ⇓

[Verse 1]

Guns, bitches, hoes, crack

Death and disease, and a baseball bat

S-T-Ds that have no name

Down at the clinic with a face full’a shame

Russian Roulette with a naked flame

Dangerously slow but in the fast lane

A big nose bleed and a bag of cocaine

Just got the news about the tumour in my brain

But we don’t care so we sniff it all the same

Caught my best friend sleepin’ with my girlfriend, Jane

Now I’m thinkin’ of a way to get them slain

***assins for hire, they shall get paid

Two-G, Three-G, what-ever it costs

None of those fools shoulda got me crossed

I’m just about ready for some treachorous fame

Ten grenades on the plane, whoops, another Dunblane

[Verse 2]

Mass murderin’, brains on the floor

You’re dead ‘cause I said you shouldn’t live no more

You done made me, lose my cool

Where’s my tool?  Who’s the bigger fool?

Road rage, pavement rage, all kinds of rage

You’ll be lucky if you get to see some old age

Every other day’s a good day to die

Best be careful, if you’s love your life

You don’t know nothin’, you don’t see nothin’

You don’t be nothin’, you don’t do nothin’

but we all got to be something, and somebody

but everybody here can’t be that rich

You know the sayin’ – «Life’s a bitch»

I got my finger on the trigger with a nervous twitch

Keep your mouth shut, help me dig this ditch

Don’t you be, a stupid bitch

 

[Verse 3]

I took a blunt knife, and cut a piece of my heart

That’s my sacrifice, my wayward device

it sound mad though, my self-mutilation like

Doctor Foster and his very first patients

God’s unhappy ‘cause we man’s praisin’ himself

Plannin’ to get to heaven with that earthly wealth

Blood money, grudge money, no-body budge money

Mass futility, souls on the guillotine

Meantime I unravel, callin’ Jimmy Saville

«Come fix my epitome, I bid to leave this bitterness»

♦  ‘(Brand new second-hand) Movements’  ↓

I bring you tents and girth to this homegrown range

Bona fide what you hear, tis the sound of pain

But pain leads to gain so we dare not stagnate

We elevate to that next state, motion divine

Glisten like crystal ball and stand tall

With this knowledge and overstanding

Enterprise landing, bringing dem new brands of buff

Yes, we come proper with potency

Ain’t no blood in my body, it’s liquid soul in my vein

I dance on a thin line of sane and deranged

And it’s all criss once I get neatly in the cipher

Chat like pickney to the piper that pied

As this natural mystic blows through the air

These lessons of life become crystal clear

Precision of my vision is ital

Separating sharks from the blessed is vital

Now I can smell a rat coming from a mile round the corner

One time I bored ya, twice you can’t couf

No, we won’t stop rebuke thee

You satanics, you fools can’t recruit me

Not now while there’s

 

[Chorus]

Movements fi make, typhoons grew

Strong and cold-sheist them a still coast through . . .

Left, right, left, right, left, right, left, right

 

I’ll slap the bacon out your mouth, dance upon your sarnie

Rolling with Jah bredren dem, God-blessed army

How the hell you gon stop this tide from steady coming

Run and catch in tune with the elements

At speed we proceed, traction for action

Hot 125, government goons get dashed to the side

Too big to slide now, though they try to disguise

I can still recognize devilworks when I see it

Weakheart disciples keep weakheart friends

Always had a hate for what their weakhearts defend

They fiend for that crack, ain’t no one to tax

We might run home and smoke a brown bag of seed

Best believe that these times is treacherous

And I know not how else I’m supposed to act

But stand close to culture roots-fi

See me getting deft with that two-step shuffle

Haggling others who for the cause

Reigning with that roots type terror

Freaking at your weakhearty era but

We build, move and prove that we don’t suffer fools

 

Movements fi make, typhoons grew

Strong and cold-sheist them a still coast through . . .

Left, right, left, right, left, right, left, right . . .

♦  ‘The Witness‘  ⇓

Taskmaster burst the bionic zit-splitter
Breakneck speed we drown ten pints of bitter
We lean all day and some say that ain’t productive
That depend upon the demons that you’re stuck with
Cause right now, I see clearer than most
I sit here contending with this cheese on toast
I feel the pain of a third world famine
Segue, we count them blessings and keep jamming
It’s him scumbag, scum of the earth, his worth was nil
Until he gained the skill of tongues
From fifteen years young  straight to my greyback self
I stay top shelf material,  jerk chicken, jerk fish
Breakaway slave, bliss
Generate gees and then we stash ‘em in the Swiss
Fools can’t see this, audio pistols
A fistful of hip hop banzai, progressing in the flesh
Esoteric quotes, most frightening
Duppy took a hold of my hand while I was writing
Let go me ting,  let go me hand
I summon up the power of banana clan!

[Chorus  x4]
Witness the fitness – The Cruffiton liveth
One hope, one quest . . .

Swigging that beetroot juice, now we dipping and boost
Set the spirit dem loose, go head go slash up the noose
We conclusive proof of both the truth, the right
Cause whether we hitchhike or push bike or travel kind of trash
Manifest that with wholesome roots rap, manifest that, yeah!
I do my same way, ain’t nothing else I know
Gone up in the life with this here rag-and-bone flow
Squeeze the pain from my belly and set my soul free
Travel over ocean, land and sea,  face nuff stress and difficulty
Flung back from the brink,  gwan in kinda stink
We don’t give a frigg about what dem fools think
Frigg your network, our debt work a speak for itself
Proof of the trophy and champion belt
Come sun, come rain, come hailstone pelt

Witness the fitness – The Cruffiton liveth
One hope, one quest . . .

Bwana Smith with some old time shit
Let the whole world know we on some off-key tip
Mega-manic when time the pressure start lick
By the hook or by the crook, by the poop or by the kick
He’s sickly cryptic, spitting that code
And most proud to present that Cruffiton mode
And it shows that they bros done seen a few sleights
Life throws scenarios, reality bites
We in collision with the beast
Lost we religion and we can’t get no peace
Idiot weakhearts want to take I for chief
Stoop to their level and we plotting cold grief
But we should know that discipline maketh the gees
Separation of the DAT from the rap, that’s a must
Proceed set speed with the Cruffiton touch
Proceed set speed..Cruffiton, y’all

[Chorus  …  x4]

∞   w/  The Cinematic Orchestra ↓  ‘All Things To All Men’

And now it seems as if we’re used to the shegree
We made our beds and now we hate where these beds be
Took nothing at all to part this Red Sea

I’m a shackled child, singing the good song of freedom
They’ve got no pride – they interrupt our grieving

Tear drops dropping for the pain of the world
My best friend dies when she was just a young girl

Left me here to fend for myself – Now the pain never leaves
We just learn to cope so when the devil needs hangin’

Will you tie up the rope and shout, «Pull»?
Let’s put an end to this bull – Zen thing

How many years before we practice what we preach
How many tears before we truly clinch the peak

Only to find that there is no honey on the moon
Official goon with the unofficial croon

I’m all things to all men
All of the women, all the children
Just say when and I’ll take you to my tardis
Who’s the hardest, who’s the hardest . . .

Look at the monster you make
Look at the monster you pay
But you claim no responsibility
But you claim not

We’re searching for Jesus
But I’ll be damned if I’ll be crucified
By 10,000 spies, compulsive lies
They hate me, they love me, they hate me

‘Cause I’m all things to all men
All of the women, all the children
Just say when and I’ll take you to my tardis
Who’s the hardest, who’s the hardest

•→ ‘Stolen Youth’ ⇔ [lyrics]

♦  GDMFSOB  ↓  (UNKLE Uncensored DJ Shadow Remix_2003)

Now this happens to be what they might call  or what they might term a remix.  A rethink, a rejiggle.

So who’s that?
I see many lights before me… Many lights!

Dark shadows
Nice Unkles and a Rooty-toot Manuva

Swell then!  A shizzle
More bass.

Find me a space,
Find me a space on, on the beat, yeah!

Round chemist, menace
Who that met off for this five whore

Totally soft, From jokey-jammin’ Now we plannin’
Now we mannin’ that mission now

Rediss and dismantle, my spambo
Knockin’ you down, come catch this sound
Heavy weight now, takin’ you there
You made me take wow, wait now
Walk to the light, that baptism
Medicinal positionin’
Visit now we fishin’ in my jin sin in acid
See my dick’s never flacid
Tax machine
Leanin’ and mean
Sweat ‘til it hurts
Splurt my bambino
My Brian or my Eno
Oops-my-daisy,
Can’t see your face never faze me
Love for day my oxi
Sonny is he crazy?
Yes y’all, chicks in the bathroom
They hippy high heels with the lippy
Now we sick to the back tooth
Uncouth, corner the room
They’ll cut root now
Sonic yarp youth
See the light, see the truth now

You little piece of dick brained, horse shit,

slime sucking son of a whore!

You live with a cocksucking mynx, you scumbag,

you low-lifed motherfucker!

Badder boy, ship ahoy
Ghosts how we do this
We fucked up, we tucked up
Leave me to thief police car
Ride don’t know me
Won’t you walk with me slowly?
Yes y’all, you don’t got no time to be stood
One doosh, one toosh
Irrigation, colonic
My trance for you, ‘tronic
We on it like a sonic
We done it ‘cos we dance from long time
The prime
Porky walky
See the codes on my
My walkie talkie

Breaker one nine, breaker ten to we stage you

True up to the faith
‘cause it just can’t be replaced
Put a poem on that dark place
See it from that dump state
Burn down that hate shootin’
Practiced in the state
With that snake that I sting you
That statement stage will
‘cause most of the time we keep it all for real now

Goddamn motherfuckin’ son of a bitch . . .

Most of the time we keep it all for real now

G.D.M.F.S.O.B.
Goddamn motherfuckin’ son of a bitch, goddamn!
G.D.M.F.S.O.B.
Goddamn motherfuckin’ son of a bitch

Everybody move!
More bass, bass, bass, bass…

Goddamn motherfuckin’ son of a bitch
Goddamn motherfuckin’ son of a

‘cause most of the time we keep it all for real now

Goddamn motherfuckin’ son of a bitch … Goddamn motherfuckin’ son of a bitch

G.D.M.F.S.O.B.
Goddamn motherfuckin’ son of a bitch, Goddamn!
G.D.M.F.S.O.B.
‘cause most of the time we keep it all for real now
G.D.M.F.S.O.B.
Goddamn motherfuckin’ son of a bitch, Goddamn!
G.D.M.F.S.O.B.
Goddamn motherfuckin’ son of a bitch!

U.N.K.L.E
UNKLE
Shadow
Roots Manuva
Shwell then – Well then!
Yes y’all!
Shwell then – Well then!
Can you tell them?
‘cause if you don’t tell them, somebody will!

Goddaaaamn, motherfuckin’, son of a biiiitch!

That’s how we like it now.