Makeshift Patriot - Sage Francis

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Makeshift Patriot Lyrics

(People talking)
I'm tired of hearing of young fellows, who think you know it all.
You know nothing, you have not seen a shot fired,
and you're waving the damn flag.

Frank, what's that man?

I'm just watching some bullshit.
On the news. It's fucking bullshit.
Reporters trying to win a fucking emmy.

Makeshift patriot,
the flag shop is out of stock,
I hang myself at half mast.
(3x)

It's the makeshift,
The patriot,
the flag shop is out of stock,
I hang myself for your live telecast.

Coming live from my own funeral
Beautiful weather offered a nice shine,
Which is suitable for a full view of a forever altered skyline.
It's times like these I freestyle biased opinions every other sentence.
My journalist ethic slips when I pass them off as objectives.
Don't give me that ethical shit.
I've got exclusive, explicit images to present to impressionable american kids,
and it's time to show this world how big our edifice is.
That's exactly how they attacked,
when a typically dark-skinned disney villain.
Use civillians against civillians and charge the trojan horse into our buildings.
Using commercial aviation as instruments of destruction.
Pregnant women couldn't protect their children;
wheelchairs were stairway obstructions.
I had to back-pedal from the shower of glass and metal,
wondering if after it settles,
we'll find who provided power to radical rebels.
The melting pot seems to be calling the kettle black when it boils over,
but only on our own soil,
so the little boy holds a toy soldier,
and waits for the suit and tie to come home.
We won't wait till he's older, though,
before we destroy hopes for a colder war to end.
I'll get a close-up of his head.

Makeshift patriot,
the flag shop is out of stock,
I hang myself at half mast.
(3x)

It's the makeshift,
The patriot,
the flag shop is out of stock,
I hang myself while the stock markets crash.

The city is covered in inches of muck.
I see some more pictures of victims are up
Grieving mothers are thinking their children are stuck,
leaping lovers are making descisions to jump while holding hands,
to escape the brutal heat;
sometimes in groups of three.
The fallout was far beyond the toxic clouds where people look like debris
but all they say when all was said,
beyond the talking heads,
was the bloody dust with legs,
looking like the walking dead calling for meds.
All the hospitals overwhelmed,
volunteers need to go the hell home.
Moments of silence for firefighters were interrupted by cell phones.
Who's going to make that call, to increase an unknown death toll?
Its the one we rally behind.
He's got a megaphone, promising to make heads roll.
We'd cheer him on, but asbestos is affecting our breath control.
The less we know, the more they fabricate,
the easier it is to sell souls.

(Man talking)
There is a new price on freedom, so buy into it while supplies last.
Changes need to be made;
no more curbside baggage,
seven pm curfew,
racial profiling will continue with less bitching.
We've unified over who to kill, so until I find more relevant scripture to quote,
remember, our kind is bigger, stronger, smarter, and much wealthier.
So wave those flags with pride, especially the white part.

We're selling addictive, twenty-four hour candlelight vigils on TV.
Freedom will be defended at the cost of civil liberties.
The viewers are glued to television screens, stuck,
'cause lots of things seem too sick.
I use opportunities to pluck heartstrings for theme music.
I'll show you which culture to pump your fist at,
which foot is right to kiss.
We don't really know who the culprit is yet,
but he looks like this.
We know who the heroes are,
they're not the xenophobes who act hard.
We taught that dog to squat,
how dare he do that shit in our own back yard.
They happen to scar our financial state,
and char our landscape.
Can you count how many times so far I ran back the same damn tape?
While the cameraman creates news and shoves it down our throats,
on the west bank, with the ten second clip put on constant loop to provoke US angst.
So get your tanks and load your guns and hold your sons in a family huddle,
'cause even if we win this tug of war and even the score,
humanity struggles.
There's a need of blood for what's been uncovered under the rubble;
some of them dug for answers in the mess,
but the rest were looking for trouble.

Makeshift patriot,
the flag shop is out of stock,
I hang myself at half mast.
(3x)

It's the makeshift,
The patriot,
the flag shop is out of stock,
I hang myself.
Don't waive your rights with your flags.

(Two people talking)
Seriously, if I want to find out anything, I'm not going to read Time Magazine,
I'm not going to read Newsweek, I'm not going to read any of these magazines.
I mean, because they've just got too much to lose by printing the truth,
you know that.

What kinds of truths are they omitting?

Well, anything.
Even on a worldwide basis.
They'd just go off the stands in a day if they printed really the truth.

What is really the truth?

Well, really the truth is just a plain picture.

Lyrics provided by LyricsEver.com
Paul "Sage" Francis (born November 18, 1976 in Miami, Florida) is a hip-hop artist based in Providence, Rhode Island.

Noted for his intense flow and sharp wit, Francis has won acclaim both as a freestyle battler and as an unapologetic, intellectual lyricist. Francis uses a broad emotional palette to address a wide range of personal, cultural, and political issues. His unconventional style and persona have given him crossover appeal, but at the same time alienated some hip-hop listeners.

Prior to embarking on a full-time career as an MC, Francis displayed his skills in slam poetry. During the late 1990s, he recorded his first demo tape (1996), fronted the now defunct Providence hip-hop band Art Official Intelligence, and hosted a weekly slot on independent radio station WRIU (the "True School Session"). He also formed the Non-Prophets and released a 12” (Drop Bass/Bounce/I Keep Calling, Emerge Records, 1999), following up in 2003 with their first full-length offering, Hope. Francis is a contemporary of underground hip-hop artists such as Slug, Eyedea, Sole and the anticon. collective. He is also loosely affiliated with the vague underground hip-hop super-group The Orphanage.

As a solo performer, Francis won the MC battle at the 2000 Scribble Jam, and in 2001 he came close to repeating as champion (semi-finalist) while performing as his "metal" alter ego, "Xaul Zan". Francis released his first proper solo album, Personal Journals, on Anticon. in 2002. He toured with a live band on the Live Band Dead Poet Tour to support it. Francis subsequently became the first hip-hop artist to sign with Punk label Epitaph, agreeing to a three-album deal. His first album for Epitaph, A Healthy Distrust, was released in early 2005 and was followed up with Human the Death Dance in 2007.

One of Francis' best-known tracks is "Makeshift Patriot", a commentary on the American media recorded one month after the September 11, 2001 attacks which he released on the internet as an MP3 as well as a limited edition 7" single.

In February 2005 Sage dropped his second full length album on the originally punk label Epitaph, it was widely regarded as the best underground hip hop album of the year by critics and fans alike and featured heavily political tracks such as "The Buzz Kill" and "Slow Down Gandhi" and more personal material like that more similar to that of his debut 'Personal Journals' such as 'Bridle' and a few heavily satirical comments on the modern day rap and urban scene such as the satirical comment on youth gun culture 'Gunz Yo'.

Sage has helped to set up the Wiki KnowMore.org which is described as a 'way to keep tabs on the some of the biggest and most dangerous businesses in the world'. He is a vegetarian and also chooses to abstain from drugs and drinking, though doesn't label himself as "straight-edge" because he believes "you shouldn't define yourself by what you don't do."

Sage has set up his own label and signed some of who he claims to be his favorite artists of the moment such as Buck 65 and Proplyphic and Reanimator named Strange Famous (which shares his initials) with which he released his most recent work 'Human the Death Dance'

This album was released in May 2007 and takes a step away from the heavily political 'Healthy Distrust' and heads back to the more personal lyrics of 'Personal Journals' and comments on modern culture. The album features cameos from many Strange Famous artists such as Buddy Wakefield, Buck 65 and Reanimator.

In 2010 Sage released his fourth full length album Li(f)e (the title coming from the famous quote from 'The Cure' on the Non-Prophets album Hope "Life is just a lie with an f in it and death is definite"). The album was extremely well received and one particular single off of the album 'The Best Of Times' received extensive air play on the popular British radio station Radio 1. After Sages Li(f)e tour Sage has stated that he will no longer be doing tours but will still be releasing albums and other materials, instead he will be doing select gigs throughout each year.

On 3 June 2014, Sage released his fifth studio album 'Copper Gone'. It is the first official studio album after Sage Francis announced his hiatus, which lasted for four years.
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