Lupe Fiasco feat Matthew Santos "Shining Down"
In the times of Soldier boy Tell em, Jeezy, Plies, Rick Ross, Camron and every other pathetic excuse for spit. I think my dude Lupe is the brightest star in a vacuous and Cimmerian constellation. What follows is absolute genius, little homie understands rhyme, reason and rhythm. what first seems like simple words on some really involved music turns out to be more circuitous on second glance. I will decrypt it for you.
Chorus
look up in the sky
look up in the sky
you thought I was down
you thought I was gone
that I wasnt around
thought I left you alone
but look up in the sky
just look up in the sky
see that I'm everywhere
shining down on you
Verse 1
well well, is it our little author
coming back humming his hymns a little altered
your attention put back on the flow like the department of water
taking off of the door like Little Walter,
Chess? yes! baby i'm Jerry Lawler
rebel with a cause, outlaw with a lawyer
judge jury like a loop, rap name Lupe
but my daddy named me warrior
this is his memorial
Verse 2
no, i ain't the nigga trying to get a liquor line
when i be scripting lines, want this petition signed
it says i'm sick of dying, sick of this prison time
i really love my people i'm sick of pimping mine
now if we autotune that shit
we can hear the songs from that opera groomed fat b*tch
tellin us not to pursue it just to shoo it like a blacksmith
we trapped and movin round in circles like it's chapstick
and that's the same encircled way of thinking that we chat with
well wrap this like around your head like the bandanas
Fabolous used to wrap his hats with
rather be in FEDS instead of National Geographics
well I'm not having it
Verse 3
so i say hello and this is for the third time
to everybody out there who ain't never heard mine
and if you have then you know you ain't never heard lyin
Lu don't move no cowards (cow-words), you only heard lions
not a facade cherisher i'd rather have the scars
i don't idolize america, i'm dancing with the stars
all of them yeah they are too
you look up and all of us shining down on you
here is the breakdown
verse 1
“well well, is it our little author
coming back humming his hymns a little altered”
He says he is back, rapping a little different
And your attention is on his flow
“taking off of the door like Little Walter,”
He is taking off with all the door/doe (as in money) like Little Walter
This is in reference to the blues singer Little Walter who took off the doors on his Cadillac cuz it was too hot.
“Chess? yes! baby i'm Jerry Lawler
rebel with a cause, outlaw with a lawyer”
When he says ‘chess’ it also refers to the label Little Walter was signed to Chess records
But he links it to Jerry Lawler who was a wrestler nicknamed the ‘King’
And, as you may know, the king is the most important piece in chess, so what lupe is saying if this is chess then he is king.
“rebel with a cause, outlaw with a lawyer”
He then themes these next line on some legal shit
Says he is a rebel with a cause that can break the laws cuz he got a lawyer
I interpret this to mean his music is different from the pack and that he breaks the rules set in rap.
“judge jury like a loop, rap name Lupe”
The loop must mean a noose, it follows Judge, Jury, Executioner (also people used to mistakenly pronounce his name loop)
“but my daddy named me warrior
this is his memorial”
Wasalu is his real name and it means warrior.
And this is in tribute to him.
Verse 2
“no, i ain't the nigga trying to get a liquor line”
Well Jay Z and diddy got liquor lines so you see the positioning here
when i be scripting lines, want this petition signed
it says i'm sick of dying, sick of this prison time
i really love my people i'm sick of pimping mine
He wants you to co-sign that you are sick of all the death, the prison sentences, and to love your folks and stop pimping them
All the lines thus far are in autotune, and the statement autotune has somehow been the soundtrack to all that bullshit.
“now if we autotune that shit
we can hear the songs from that opera groomed fat b*tch”
I think he is saying, if you autotune that piece of positivity, you might see the end of the bullshit, Referring to the fat lady singing.
“tellin us not to pursue it just to shoo it like a blacksmith”
And she telling us to stop and shun this garbage, oh and the ‘shoo’ also means ‘shoe’
“we trapped and movin round in circles like it's chapstick
and that's the same encircled way of thinking that we chat with”
he saying we are so trapped and enslaved by these images that we own them in our daily conversations and everyday.
“well wrap this around your head like the bandanas
Fabolous used to wrap his hats with”
Fabolous thought he was creating a trend by putting his bandanas on his hats, huh? So lupe uses the image to say wrap your head around what his saying.
“rather be in FEDS instead of National Geographics
well I'm not having it”
F.E.D.S ia magazine about notorious criminals with pop culture influence. National Geographics is a nature magazine. Aside from the obvious statement that people would rather be in the gangster magazine than the one about nature, he is also saying they would rather be fed than try and analyse shit.
Verse 3
“so i say hello and this is for the third time”
This song is on his third album
“to everybody out there who ain't never heard mine
and if you have then you know you ain't never heard lyin”
If you aint never heard lupe’s music, he don’t lie
“Lu don't move no cowards, you’ve only heard lions”
This has a triple meaning if not four
1. He doesn’t move cowards, you’ve only heard lions
He don’t roll with scared folk but lions, which are generally perceived to be brave
2. He don’t moo cow words, you’ve only heard lines
He herds comprehensive, coherent lines not cow words, a cow words would be ‘moo’
3. He don’t move cow herds, you’ve only heard lions
He don’t move cow herds but lions, its different from the first cuz it is an animal reference.
“not a facade cherisher i'd rather have the scars”
He does like the surface fakeness of things, he would rather the long lasting scars that give one character
“I don't idolize america, i'm dancing with the stars”
He doesn’t worship America as the empire or the coarse ways, and that he is talking to stars, God. All while referring to the reality shows American Idol and Dancing With The Stars (oh by the way, I had written a song with Tumi and the volume called 'Relaity Cheque' and it uses a bunch of reality t.v shows to make some comments about the world today, so don't you think if that song comes out that dude was biting)
“all of them yeah they are too”
You, yes you are God too
you look up and all of us shining down on you
there you have it.
Your opinion of the musical faculties of others is based solely on their appreciation of ONE band?? Isn’t that ultimately quite narrow-minded and personally limiting?
That’s Tumi for you.. shoots from the hip, but reserves the right to change his opinion.
Djf - your opinion of Tumi is based solely on the reading of ONE sentence?? Isn’t that ultimately quite narrow-minded and personally limiting?
No Nathan, what makes you think that I have formed an opinion of him? One sentence in his review SUGGESTS that he may be adopting a more narrow and dogmatic opinion of others’ tastes, but maybe he hasn’t expressed himself as accurately or comprehensively as he would have liked (much as you have done in previous posts)? Hence my response is posed as a QUESTION rather than an accusation. Maybe we can wait for Tumi’s response before polarising this discussion further?
Sick sounds, thanks for the link.
As you may have noticed, my post was also a question.
@nathan you are a great writer and obviously a very intelligent guy, i’m really glad that you are writing and that a platform such as mahala exists. i’ve just noticed a trend in your comments however to be very aggressive and to pick arguments where none even necessarily exist. Maybe that is just your method, but i’m hoping you can grow out of it. Above all, keep writing,
- hamfisted. I just get really annoyed when people make comments without really reading the words in the pieces. So I try push their buttons. Its not the best trait I know. But sometimes when something is either clearly just a brief opinion (as above) or obviously tongue in cheek (see comments under Crossing Over) and the posters miss the obvious tone or nature of them, then I just can’t help myself. Maybe I should get out more.
I think Tumi is just saying… that Little Dragon is ubiquitous and synonymous with good taste. That’s all. I mean, I don’t think he’d judge you as a nutmonkey with no taste if you had never heard of them
…and if you had heard them and they didn’t appeal to you?
@Andy
Little Dragon is not ‘ubiquitous’, and Tumi himself acknowledges this in the second sentence, calling them a ‘kinda-known’ band.
Otherwise, I’m really fucking sick and tired of people arguing over their musical tastes. People seem to think that you can be an accomplished critic of the musical medium without a fraction of the study you’d require to be a similarly constituted film, architecture or visual art critic (that Levi’s Original Music magazine was a perfect example - a bunch of decent writers and unqualified music listeners writing about music as if their opinion means something).
People also think you can approach music logically, and that you can hold the logically tenable position that your taste in music is better than someone else’s; which is, macrocosmically, so fucking tenuous a piece of thinking.
In Tumi’s defence, it was obviously a throwaway line - he’d be an utter idiot to literally judge someone’s musical tastes based on one ‘kinda-known’ band.
Anonymous raises some important issues regarding the overall quality of SA music journalism. I find Tumi’s silence on this issue a bit baffling.
DJF - Tumi’s on tour in France with his band The Volume.I’d be surprised if he took the time to weigh in on a debate as petty as this. As an accomplished musician, he a) knows a lot about music and is a qualified critic; b) has unique and interesting taste and; c) he’s sharing this stuff with us as a kind of head’s up. Yes, he used a loose turn of phrase in his opening line, but he’s just giving us a heads up on this cool band.
Anon - Little Dragon are ubiquitous amongst people whose taste Tumi respects.
Did either of you guys even click on the link and listen to the music? Because all you’re arguing about is the exclusivity of that one throwaway line… and the validity of music journalism on the whole…
Kinda missing the point, methinks.
@Andy
“Little Dragon are ubiquitous amongst people whose taste Tumi respects”.
The word ubiquitous means widely present, omnipresent, universal or found everywhere - to say that Little Dragon are ubiquitous amongst people whose taste Tumi respects is to completely defeat the meaning of the word. It’s like saying, “The length of my nostril hair is known across the galaxy… and by across the galaxy, I mean everyone who lives in Green Point.”
I did actually click the link, immediately, to listen to Little Dragon. But I think the the more intriguing theme of music journalism’s lack of foundation for appraisal is the far superior attention-grabber. And your line about Tumi being a musician and having unique/interesting taste, motors on by completely ignoring my sentiments.
Anyway, we’re all missing the point. This ‘article’ is really just one man giving a musical recommendation (which we’re all equally qualified to do), and opening up with the arrogant, blinded throwaway line that if your taste doesn’t equal his taste then you have no taste.
Andy, firstly I must congratulate the crew at Mahala for putting together a site that fills the gaping hole in South African cultural journalism that has existed until recently. It’s such a joy to be able to go to one place to find a wide variety of bold opinions (and discussion) on less mainstream events and activities. This is so much more informative and enlightening than going from one personal blog to another and having to endure the same old grey and dogmatic comments from only one person’s perspective. There is a huge challenge that you guys can rise to if you’re up for it and I sincerely hope that you get support from a growing base of media-literate readers.
Now, if you’re going to rise to that challenge I strongly suggest that you employ a degree of editorial discretion before posting reviews and opinion pieces. I seriously doubt whether a reputable music publication would have let Tumi’s opening comments through without first challenging him on its syntax and perhaps encouraging him to express himself more accurately. Your subsequent comments have tried to put some spin on this and vainly suggest that because you know what Tumi actually meant (being personally acquainted), the rest of us should somehow also be able to grasp the spirit of what he was saying. This is perhaps a rather naive defense of what is ultimately sloppy journalism.
Language is language, and in the absence of the slightest shred of irony (or any other figure of speech that could blur our interpretation of his words) those opening remarks could only mean one thing. There’s no point in trying to suggest otherwise.
Points taken… we’re a work in progress.
Hey folks, please forgive the silence. Its just I have been doing cool band shit like playing music to audiences across Europe and buying caseloads of Champaign for my next video shoot.
1. Context is imperative, this article was cut and pasted from my blog. The post was called “I mess with this” emphasis on the “I”. Little Dragon is great
2. I am not Eduard Hanslick ; I am a music lover with some writing skills. Little Dragon is great
3. Peer to peer criticism makes the most sense, but is not the panacea. Little Dragon is great
4. I am fucking awesome. I don’t speak to people called anonymous even when I forget your name. The best way to handle the malicious critic is to ignore him. Little Dragon is great
5. Every one has a socio-political agenda, I like a work or review it as to whether or not it fits the goals of that agenda. Little Dragon is great
6. What is the goal of criticism? Rhetorical. Little Dragon is great
7. I would never judge you on what you like, as you would never do that to me. Little Dragon is great
8. Being a rapper, means I can say bitch, ass, cunt, Malcolm X, Ed Norton, peace, love and write with no trace of civility. Little Dragon is great
“The critic has to educate the public; the artist has to educate the critic.”
Oscar Wilde
I yield to the deductions and the oceanic density of this quotes intelligence.
For the record this "Tumi Molekane" is not me. I have written into Mahala once commenting on Transformers 2 the movie. Suede put me on to the comments on the article when I was on twitter. I.D theft, dude took the time out to reply and even mention Malcolm X and say Peace Folks at the beginning like do when I start my shows. huh! Cyber clones.