Street Livin' lyrics

[Intro]

Streets, streets

Livin' in the streets

[Verse 1: will.i.am]

Street livin', caught in the trap

Guns or books, sell crack or rap

Be like kings or be like pawns

They called us coons, now they call us cons

Street niggas be packing pistols

Terrorists be blasting missiles

Crips and Bloods and retail thugs

CIA planes bring Colombian drugs in

Don't push me 'cause I'm close to hell

The teachers in my neighborhood can hardly spell

And compare to them, prison guards get paid well

Ten years no bail is 4 years at Yale

So, forget about the statue of General Lee

Because the status of blacks are generally

Gonna end up in some penitentiary

Systematically, that's how they made it to be

Listen, they derailed the soul train

And put a nightmare in every Martin Luther King

And privatized prisons are owned by the same

Slave masters that owned the slave trade game

And racists no longer have to be racist

'Cause niggas kill more niggas than the KKK did

Now, every time I hear a new def jam

Niggas killing niggas like they Ku Klux Klan

I understand what's a nigga to choose?

Be the killer or be the dead dude in the news

I get it, what's a nigga to do?

No education in the hood got a nigga confused

[Verse 2: apl.de.ap]

Street livin', tough conditions

Brainwashed by the television

We lost in the war we live in

Double cross love lost no religion

Street livin', oh my gosh

Another brother got shot by the searg'

Another cop got off with no charge

If you black in the hood, you at large

You're guilty until you prove you're innocent

If you're ivory, they treat you different

If you're ebony, they assume your temperament

Will be vigilant and they call you militant

And you'll get shot and they'll say the incident

Is 'cause you're belligerent, what a coincidence?

Born and bred but you're still an immigrant

And if you ain't dead, you can see imprisonment

[Chorus: will.i.am]

There's more niggas in the prisons than there ever was slaves cotton picking

There's more niggas that's rotting in the prisons than there ever was slaves cotton picking

So, how we gon' get up out the trap?

Guns or books, sell crack or rap

Street livin', hustle or hoops

Guns or books, get shot or shoot

[Verse 3: Taboo]

Street livin', ain't no rules

Break the law, make the breakin' news

The life you choose could be the life you lose

Niggas getting stuck for the Nike shoes

Street livin', ain't no joke

It's a cold world, better bring your coat

Revoke 'cause the streets are broke

And now they wanna take away our dreams and hopes

Street livin', no economics

No way out of the Reaganomics

Infected by the black plague, new bubonic

No comprende, we speak ebonics

Street livin', what's your position?

You can take action or take a dick and listen

You can get fucked by the system

Or you can say "fuck the system"

• Artist:The Black Eyed Peas
• Album:MASTERS OF THE SUN VOL.1 (2018)