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Raw Routes

by Height Keech

/
1.
When I’m out and a band goes in I hope they came with a plan to win I hope they don’t try to be too coy they gotta go all out to motivate the boy I need a beat that’ll break the chain and sweep feet off the known terrain I want to jump into the sun you gotta do something that cannot be done I’m starving in my mind On a starlit grind When these MC’s rock the spot I hope it’s not just off the knot I hope they got the presentation down Hope they don’t try to wing it, and smack the ground I hope mans want to bring that twist to hit fans like a swinging fist I hope they got a surprise in store I hope they thought up stuff I never thought before I’m starving in my mind On a starlit grind We can’t dream until the room gets set So don’t blast off with no sound just yet Somebody’s gotta tell these rubes Turn off the TV’s and florescent tubes Don’t say the things that you think I’d like Put us in your sites and ignite the strike Say it simple and keep it stark Show us what goes on in the deepest dark I’m starving in my mind On a starlit grind
2.
If Hitler won the war, there would be no rock and roll No MC’s on the mic, out talking bold No art spray painted on the walls That wasn’t up to protocols If Hitler won, he would put it all on hold No Rock & Roll Them German boys that made that krautrock sound Hitler would never let them get that off the ground No robot pop, no motorik No popul voh, Kosmische Musik If Hitler won, he’d have to shut that down No Rock & Roll Them goose-steppers of old are marching back They traded brown shirts for that yellow and that black But there can be no compromise If we’d appeased those kind of guys Our world would just be ashes, front to back No Rock & Roll
3.
Out at the factory, where the soft wheel spins fast Up and out early now, clocking out last Old times cold kicking up dust on that post long gone like a tornado spun out to that coast got a head full of dead wires, a box of dead fruits Big doom that drives guys to stomp dreams with their boots But the mind’s on that mission, and the hunger won’t quell And we pray to that night, to get free from this spell Desert Racers In the daylight locked down Desert Racers In the deadest of towns Desert Racers Keep your souls out of sight Until the ghosts from that old world can rise by the night Drive through the county in the night in these rains Moving road flares and road cones in these lanes Gotta sweat for these coins, until the moon's burning black Got the key to that highway in the wilds out back Desert scape in my memory, coming in like a flood Desert took all my money, desert drained all my blood But I’m headed back west, heard a new siren sing If we die in those sands, we’ll come back as kings Desert Racers In the daylight locked down Desert Racers In the deadest of towns Desert Racers Keep your souls out of sight Until the ghosts from that old world can rise by the night
4.
{Height} Walk through them snows Zoom through those towns The lamplight it glows Camped out on these grounds Let’s blast out these sounds Go nuts on these bills Let’s cut through these pathways And stomp through these hills Now Jesus was a freak Said blessed are the meek Came back out to black out Let’s push past the peak Sit down, let me speak Leave herbs in these hails Let’s walk down these highways With raps wrapped in bales {Illingsworth} This life is roller-coasting full of locomotion, overdosing I’d rather be row-boating in the open ocean Suffering from liquor sweats rupturing my liver, whilst sculpturing a cup with chisel numbering a finished set Walk with weasley varmints in the eastern market Each team link reeks of garbage the leader’s whoever blinks the hardest Or whoever can streak the farthest while outrunning police departments We can walk in peace or unleash the marmot {Mister} Portrait of a tumbleweed Picture me rolling A certain something about neil young, rust and sleep Is keeping me going The blood is pumping, applying heat to the frozen And dropkicking any impeding the motion Loose cannon Flyin' Brian, find me floating Over all these crumb bums, dum dums and lushes A marathon, man i don’t see the need for rushing, I’m walking
5.
Back in the days, when hip-hop was new Me and my pals thought rhyming was the thing to do Nobody had the know-how, in my neck of the woods We went to Radio Shack, to get the cheapest of goods You could make a four-track out of plugs and cords Your Dad’s tape deck and some mickey mouse keyboards Quarter-inch to RCA, RCA to quarter-inch It wasn’t quad studios, but it could work in a pinch Long Gone That’s a wrap for Radio Shack There ain’t a radio shack left in all MD Even the one by the food court in frank scott key No more dollar priced wires hanging off of the walls Now they’re all empty shells in abandoned malls I hate to see em all go through the final throes Now that radio runs off of 1’s and 0’s But it’s a new day and time, shit's changing up fast And you can’t pine for things that played out in the past Long Gone That’s a wrap for Radio Shack
6.
Raw Routes 01:44
Another shift in this blown out jungle Another ride round a silent spring A day’s work buys a midnight mission A midnight mission is a sacred thing It takes a life just to map one passage It takes a life just to mine one gem To show em more than just nighttime talking To give em more than wide eyed mayhem Raw Routes Scaling up these walls Raw Routes The desert moonlight calls It’s hard to move with the wind still whistling With the sand blowing in these eyes We press on like the old folks told us Fortified under frozen skies Best of us seen a dream get melted To something not worth dreaming up Still we hunt for a bright flame burning That won’t wilt like a scarlet cup Raw Routes Scaling up these walls Raw Routes The desert moonlight calls
7.
{ialive} Gang Way, it's heating up for the posse cut Still the rhymes stay colder than a hockey puck Everyone all around trying to copy us But can’t repeat what it is, we make it obvious Fake imposter rosters cant rock with us The language beautiful like the colors on an octopus Rocksteady like a mutated rhinoceros With more variety and evolution than Galapagos {Height Keech} Bomb tossing, beat bashing. boys crossing the lines Like the five man electric, out smashing the signs I made wine from the vines, plus the mead in the mill I hit the drum in the night, when it was quiet and still I’m John Frum on the hill, with a boat full of goods Driving trucks full of bills, to a shrine in the woods My minds growing, out-glowing all the corniest creeps With the meanest team going, got the cleanest of sweeps {Hemlock Ernst} Any mandible can cannibal your life in my hands Candling branches filled with pamphlets on supply in demand Suppyling vitamins daily, your five alive in a jam I concentrate, wildstyle the force I operate Formulas of positive forces The negative, vibrate and resonate through corridors Back alleys and choruses For tourists of the tearing eye, coarse as tongues tested and tried To escape, the stream of corpses, to the palace inside {Goldzilla} Three Sculpture phones, two of them on call waiting At my shrink’s office staring at a cat painting All my friends are alive and doing work XL coogi shirt bigger than uzi vert Looking for a betty white to slow dance Hoping the inferno drops betty wright at slow jams Only rap for the sport and tom foolery Just warming up to take over for chuck woolery {PT Burnem} Diving off the edge and into a forgotten land Briefcase trusty plus the rhyme stands Heisman hand No stage, no shoes, no etiquette Hit you with the wild Bruce Lee type kinetic shit We keep it under 32 and do it coast to coast One up to Speak N' Eye, One up to Bowie's ghost One up to any who illuminate a dark place That common purpose is connecting us through time and space {Mister} Whole world spinning has me feeling Tasmanian Minus the leather vest repping Harley Davidson Buck naked, frothing at the mouth If you’re sitting on your ass, then I’m fucking up your couch A price menace at any store that I might visit Never give a free pass to a mic midget Standard protocol since I was a tyke little Ketchup and Mustard man coming with them diced pickles
8.
I can’t believe there’s a meme shooter It seems so incredibly dumb It feels like it just wouldn’t happen I don’t know a soul so numb I can’t believe anyone’s laughing As they sat back and watched it at home But maybe that’s just what they dreamed A nightmare unfolding by one of their own I can’t believe there’s a meme shooter I believed when I heard about Kent State I believed Tiananmen Square They just seemed like bad things that would happen When power wont yield to the change in the air But these guys really thought it was funny To rob 49 souls folks of their breath It really breaks your heart apart to know That half the world’s lost in this cult of death I can’t believe there’s a meme shooter Must be people out there that feel nothing Like the earth’s just a video game People for whom, seeing something like that, or seeing nothing like that Is all one and the same And of course, folks, I’m nobody’s doctor And I can’t cure this insanity But if you feel the way I’m describing Please let me appeal to your humanity I can’t believe there’s a meme shooter
9.
Recruit by the nights, shoot out these brights Boys crept in one step, we leapt toward the lights We ran hard as nails, don’t drift in that mist Take this game off the rails, they shot but they missed We can charge down these trails, an ice cold endeavour New leads to sow seeds, I’m full speed as ever Press down on that lever, reveal the whole jawn Waking up to get moving, off another cold dawn Hold on, through the static, camped in the attic My mind is a midnight train headed to Braddock I’m westbound by route, came back here to shout Saw the crescent moon glowing, now I’m going all out We don’t move like a heart drained bloodless We don’t talk like a drained out lake Hardest times never broke us open Hardest days make the stone walls shake We live now through the lightless chapters We don’t yearn for the world that was You can’t plant your flag in our memory We gotta scream through the constant buzz Got the old time record player hooked, I stop and looked Let the 45 play while the pasta cooked Heard the sounds coming out of the past About a nonstop summer that’s forever to last But it ain’t a blue beach, where the unit belongs Cause nowadays it’s a war, when you want to do songs We know you can’t bend the spoon, with your force of your brain We dive in and and kept treading through an ocean of pain On a chase of all chases, gone for the gold Racing off to places till we’re haggard and old In Indio going in, throwing needles to grooves Where wild starlight’s popping and the mystery moves We don’t move like a heart drained bloodless We don’t talk like a drained out lake Hardest times never broke us open Hardest days make the stone walls shake We live now through the lightless chapters We don’t yearn for the world that was You can’t plant your flag in our memory We gotta scream through the constant buzz
10.
You work alone, you work alone Downtown in the commercial zone And everyday, the same type of fuss You told me run, you told me run From the jaws of the setting sun And every kill for me is a kill for us I thought by now I could whisk you into some castle But we're still trudging through the mud in these worn-down shoes I saw you walk through the wind and the rain And I know it's a lonely living Someday we'll cure your damn working woman blues I work alone, I work alone Out trying to turn over every stone but every treasure found has a hidden cost I try to run, I try to run But the winter's just begun I wasn't fast enough to keep you out the frost I thought by now I could whisk you into some castle but we're still trudging through the mud in these worn-down shoes I saw you walk through the wind and the rain and I know it's a lonely living someday we'll cure your damn working woman blues
11.
On the quiet block, where we used to stay I saw these corny stores in a vast array That place was lonely in a way it’s never been The spirit running round had vanished in the wind It made me think on the short hours in the day Last Light (Hey Dummy) They say these final times can turn a man to stone The sharpest harp gets lost in an endless drone You want to bring all the good times back But breaking down’s just a natural fact We gotta crash head first into what’s unshown Last Light (Hey Dummy) Me and my pals get loud by the man-made lake We got a gold mind squad for the cold heart ache I ain’t for killing time and waiting round to die We know the way to keep the lightning in your eye We know they got us pinned, but we ain’t about to break Last Light (Hey Dummy)
12.
Mask off for all monsters Second act for the also-rans Prime time for all killers Prime time for the hollow mans Year of anthrax senders Year of nails in a homemade bomb Time of steel fence sitters Year of quiet evil calm Year of all monsters (Point em out, Point em out) Lights on for the pig's head Lights on for the swarming flies Lights out for the all is one Lights out for your lying eyes Year of screaming children Year of black pills down your neck Year of Dos Otaku Year of nonsense, year of kek Year of all monsters (Point em out, Point em out) Age of no more water Age of each man on their own Time when no one's laughing Age of unknowing all that's known Time of statues cracking Time of purple thermite smoke Year of new-born heroes Year of monster-killing folk Year of all monsters (Point em out, Point em out)

credits

released September 2, 2019

Written and Produced by Height Keech

Mixed at Lineup Room by Brandon Lackey

Gang Way - Produced by ialive / Height
Ambience on 3 - PT Burnem
Drum Programming on 9 + 12 - ialive
Guitars on 2, 4 + 9 - Travis Allen
Synths and Ambience on 4 - ialive
Backup Vocals on 10 - Ashley Alexander + Mister
Backup Vocals on 11 - Emily Slaughter, Mister + ialive
Additional Tracking by Eddie Logix

Mastered by Carl Saff

Art by ialive

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