By Ozy Majiq
Spoken: Wha' is my name? Dey call me Ozy Magiq. Now leh mih tell yuh de real story.
Was a Friday, eating doubles by Saucey
Me and mih baby belly empty and we hungry
Two blaze, two slight, two to carry,
Sit down on de bonnet 'cause we wasn't in no hurry.
Two fellahs step up, dey say, "Wham, dready?"
Ah say, "I just cool, everyting just irie."
Next ting yuh know, one pull out a speshy
He say, "Pass yuh keys, pass yuh doubles, pass yuh money!"
Well, ah start to laugh, ah find it was funny
Dey push me in de back seat of mih brand new Sunny
They say, "Don't be a hero 'cause we trigger finger itchy."
Tune in next verse fuh de res ah de story.
Wha' we go do 'bout de kidnappers, car jackers,
Coke crackers and arbitrary slackers?
Wha' we need is some old time Mamas and Papas
Who know how to be slappers and tappers
Wha' we go do 'bout de kidnappers, car jackers,
Coke crackers and parliamentary slackers?
Wha' we need is some old time Mamas and Papas
Who know how to be slappers and tappers.
Well, we started in the East, the girl start to cry
I and all quaking fuh true, dat eh no lie
Ah turn and ask one ah dem, ah say, "Why? Why?"
Bop! Ah get a gun butt, it swell up all mih eye
So ah dress back, I didn't want to die
Dey roll a spliff 'cause dey wanted to get high
Dey say, "Take a smoke. Ent you is Rastafari?"
I say, "I cannot bun wid de enemies of the one Selassie I"...Why?
Wha' we go do 'bout de kidnappers, car jackers,
Coke crackers and arbitrary slackers?
Wha' we need is some old time Mamas and Papas
Who know how to be slappers and tappers
Wha' we go do 'bout de kidnappers, car jackers,
Coke crackers and parliamentary slackers?
Wha' we need is some old time Mamas and Papas
Who know how to be slappers and tappers.
Well, dey throw we in de trunk, dey didn't like we tone
Tie we up with rope and dey take away we phone
Carry in a track and dey leave we all alone
We manage to get away by rubbing on a stone
Ah feel like ah come up out ah de twilight zone
End up in a police station, me and Simone
Dey say, "Wha's yuh name, wha happen, did de girl get bone?
Ah say, "Mih name is Ozy Magiq but dat girl is not mih own."...Why?
Wha' we go do 'bout de kidnappers, car jackers,
Coke crackers and arbitrary slackers?
Wha' we need is some old time Mamas and Papas
Who know how to be slappers and tappers
Wha' we go do 'bout de kidnappers, car jackers,
Coke crackers and parliamentary slackers?
Wha' we need is some old time Mamas and Papas
Who know how to be slappers and tappers.
Wha' we go do 'bout de kidnappers, car jackers,
Coke crackers and arbitrary slackers?
Wha' we need is some old time Mamas and Papas
Who know how to be slappers and tappers
Wha' we go do 'bout de kidnappers, car jackers,
Coke crackers and parliamentary slackers?
Wha' we need is some old time Mamas and Papas
Who know how to be slappers and tappers.
Spoken: Wha we go do? Who me? I doh know dem fellahs. Yuh understand mih? Is OzyMajiq, OzyMajiq O-Z-Y M-A-J-I-Q Yuh cyah spell it? Look, me ent ha no set ah money, pappy. I's just ah struggling entertainer. Yuh understand me? Who is she? Huh! Boy, yuh eh wanna know nah. So it go. Ah could leave now? I gone!
Wha' we go do 'bout de kidnappers, car jackers,
Coke crackers and arbitrary slackers?
Wha' we need is some old time Mamas and Papas
Who know how to be slappers and tappers
Wha' we go do 'bout de kidnappers, car jackers,
Coke crackers and parliamentary slackers?
Wha' we need is some old time Mamas and Papas
Who know how to be slappers and tappers.
Source: The lyrics posted on this blog are transcribed directly from performances. Although it is my intention to faithfully transcribe I do not get all the words and I have a knack for hearing the wrong thing. Please feel free to correct me or to fill in the words that I miss by dropping me a message via e-mail. I'd be forever grateful. Thanks in advance! .............................................................................................
A Note From The Gull
Thanks, Ozy Majiq. Your song came to mind as backdrop for the Baltimore "Slapper and Tapper of the Year" featured below:
Uploaded by CNN
I was prepared to make an exception and concede that the desperate female, thinking that her only son's life was in danger, had used her hands - the only prods available to her at that moment, to smack her child away from self -destruction. Back at the ranch, I am certain that the female a.k.a "strong black woman", is accustomed to using non-physical means of persuasion to guide her children, but this was an extraordinary situation, a life or death situation, and the two did not have the luxury of time.
In my opinion, her agreeing to appear on interviews and be used by the reactionary mainstream and vapid social media does adds insult to injury. In her own words, she did not want her son to become another Freddie Gray? Is that Baltimorese for "Let the Devil take the hindmost"? Yes, I understand that she believes that her first priority is her son's life but if the sister had to mention Freddie Gray, now that her collusion has earned her the mike and Twitter hash tags, why use his death as just a cautionary tale without publicly questioning the society in which violence is dispensed so freely at home and abroad. Freddie Gray was not some young wildebeest who strayed away from the munching herd to be dragged off to his death by marauding jackals.
So now that they've given her carte blanche to beat her children away from the "revolting" hordes to the fragile safety of acquiescence, she seems contented to go along, to chat with these people, most of whom did not and still do not care about her or her life and wouldn't have even known about Freddie Gray's story if protesters had not taken it to the streets. In any other situation where rocking the system had not been involved, this woman would have been censured for child abuse. But in this society, violence of any sort that reflects and supports the status quo is lauded. No surprises there. Trinbagonians know the score.
So now that they've given her carte blanche to beat her children away from the "revolting" hordes to the fragile safety of acquiescence, she seems contented to go along, to chat with these people, most of whom did not and still do not care about her or her life and wouldn't have even known about Freddie Gray's story if protesters had not taken it to the streets. In any other situation where rocking the system had not been involved, this woman would have been censured for child abuse. But in this society, violence of any sort that reflects and supports the status quo is lauded. No surprises there. Trinbagonians know the score.
I pass the debate about the efficacy of corporal punishment to those who have proof that it is the one thing that stands between us and Armageddon. I won't even attempt to soothe you with stories about how I was beaten and turned out just fine. With the benefit of hindsight, I can assure you that none of my problems were ever addressed or solved by beatings. Beatings were just meant to make me toe whatever line I had crossed. Corporal punishment was just one quick-fix, crowd control technique to be utilised by the distracted, stressed, harassed, impatient parent/teacher. So I won't try to dress it up as love although some of you will argue that corporal punishment is done out of love, that it hurts the one dispensing it more than the one receiving but you should have asked yourselves why.
It is because those of you who are really honest, know that your actions are a signal of your own unresolved childhood traumas and your failure as adults, at consistent, thoughtful, vigilant parenting. On some level you must be aware that your child's pummelled hide is standing in for your own impotence before a system that has and continues to abuse you.
Thank you, Brendon O'Brien, for the following thoughts:
Uploaded by TTRN -Trinidad and Tobago Radio Network Limited
IT'S NOT LOVE
By Brendon O'Brien
My mother is no stranger to the idea that love makes calloused hands, that love lingers on the body, the kind of stinging sensation where my skin reminds my spirit that I will be loved as long as I act like I deserve it, and think that I don't.
A cut tail is not a conversation. There is no imparting of wisdom in whippings and wounds inflicting. There are inquiries about my age like she didn't birth me. There are statements of status like I'm her pride personified. There are reminders. This is her house. I don't belong beyond supplying some significant satisfaction when other mothers are asking how the son's acting. This is her house. I don't belong unless I've earned enough scars.
I still see the hugs and kisses her father left on her skin to cover the hurt of a generation. That's where she learned it - watching her own mother get loved to bloody near death and knowing that sometimes she was next for blows.
This is how you raised a child back in 1969. There is a manual with a prologue written by Willie Lynch. Punishment is about power. Discipline is about demonstrating control. You can only really love someone when they follow your every word quickly and soundlessly.
Love is a verb in my mother's house, a contact sport. Her will and strength come in contact with my youthful frailty and curiousity, uses one as a weapon to destroy the other.
Love is loud - screams and cries echoing through the house:
If you loved me, you wouldn't do things that I don't want you to do just because I told you not to. If you loved me, you wouldn't ask a question I don't want to answer. If you loved me, you would bend to my will. Now I have to write love on your skin with whatever blunt instrument I can find!.
My mother put a generation of her pain on my back and called it love. It's not.
My mother's hands are the reason I am afraid of the cops and I don't trust myself and I don't believe in God. My mother's hands are the reason I am Marxist and independent and don't trust anyone's love, including my own.
I imagine some folks become just as good at making love and share of their hands as often, to their children, to their friends, to their enemies, [because God said to love them too] to their girlfriends and wives and lovers lost because they said the love marks hurt their skin. I am sure they continue loving them until their dying day.
But I don't trust anyone's love, including my own.
We are putting a generation of pain on our children's backs and calling it love. It's NOT.
"Patria est communis omnium parens" - Our native land is the common parent of us all. Keep it beautiful, make it even more so.r
Blessed is all of creation
Blessed be my beautiful people
Blessed be the day of our awakening
Blessed is my country
Blessed are her patient hills.
Mweh ka allay!
Guanaguanare
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