Artist: Common f/ Cocaine 80s, Lil Herb
Album:  Nobody's Smiling
Song:   The Neighborhood
Typed by: kirenamloh@msn.com

[Intro: James Fauntleroy II]
Thousand lives ago, we were young and we didn't know
We were trading our crowns for our souls
Made the sacrifice, headed back to the light
But be careful, don't drown in the gold
I know it glows but it's cold

{Sample of "The Other Side of Town" by Curtis Mayfield}
"I'm from the other side of town
 Out of bounds, to anybody who don't live around
 I never learned to share, or how to care
 I never had no teachings about being fair"

[Common]
Have you ever heard of Black Stone around Black Stone's?
And Four CHs', Vice Lords, Stony Island on Aces
The concrete matrix street, organizations
They gave violations, hood public relations
It was the basics to get big faces
Stay away from cases, bad broads, good graces
The hustles was the taste makers and trend setters
They the ones that fed us, hopin that the feds don't get us
The era of Reagan, the terror of Bush
Crack babies mommas'll push, we were the products of Bush
I'm wishin for a Samurai Suzuki and a little Gucci
A bad hoe to B.B.D. +Do Me+, you heard of Flukey, Stokes?
It was folks and coke and dope
Fiends choked off of smoke, herringbones and rope
Rare jewels of a generation
Diamonds, blinding us of real shit we facin
Forties wasted on seats, Dion makin the beats
When they air it out at them parties, we escapin the heat
I could break it down like whatever you need
He squinted his face and rolled the weed

"Y'know they don't see sometimes.. that in the neighborhood
 It's the exact same thing, it's the same thing over and over again, feel me?"

[Lil Herb]
Have you ever heard of No Limit (1-50), 3Hunna, 6Hunna?
Folly Boy, O-Block, Eastside
Where it ain't no conversation they just let them heats ride
Can't nobody stop the violence, why my city keep lyin?
Niggaz throw up peace signs but er'rybody keep dyin
Used to post up on that strip, I look like a street sign
I've been out there three days and I got shot at three times (Damn!!)
Felt like every bullet hit me when they flew out each nine
I be happy when I wake up and I have a free mind (That's fucked up..)
I know haters wanna clap me up, watch the morgue wrap me up
But they can catch me later, I been coolin chasin paper
Where I come from ain't no hope, if you was claimin that was major
Small crib, big fam, mom was workin, grammy raised us
No food in the refrigerator, I was bangin, pullin capers, that's real shit~!
Same niggaz from day one, boy.. yeah I'm still with
Better watch out for that jump shot, cause they will hit (SWISH)
Homie take your shorty lunchbox, and won't feel shit
I came from a place where it's basic but you won't make it (nah)
Feds buildin cases, judges who racist and full of hatred 
I mean, you ain't never seen the shit that I seen

[Outro]
Coming inbound, forty-six minutes from 355 
Jim Bryant's twenty-eight out, thirty-two in
Lake Shore Drive's heavy south
North Avenue to Chicago, jammed north through Grant Park
Tr- State heavy south gulf to the Bensenville Bridge 
and St. Charles to the Stevenson Ramp
Get traffic and weather together on the 8's every ten minutes 
on News Radio, 780 and 105.9 FM