Prince – 2045 Radical Man lyrics

Spoken with crowd cheering in background}
How can a non-musician discuss the future of music from anything other than
a consumer point of view?
These few people make decisions for the bulk of us, without consulting any of us.
Sales and distributions of our futures, uh!
If this world were fair and right, they'd give up the car keys this very night.
Damn!

(Hit it!)

Two, three, four, five, six, seven
Flash forward, 2045
What did you stand for in the life of your pride
When faced with the final judgment of today
Couldn't profit from the game
That you and your niggas play

Radical man
Save the life
Come on take a stand
Give that money back
Let's make a plan
The brand new currency
Taking care of one another
You and me

(Radical man)

Flash backwards, 1999 (backwards, 1999)
In a world shot full of profit, see (Tell me)
How'd y'all stay alive? (Everyone of y'all)
Depending on this so called man
For everything you got comes from his hand
Food, water, the clothes you wear
How many of y'all niggas really care?

To care (to care)
Let's define this word nigga (define, define)
Someone who stays high (high)
Watching their life go by (by, by)
Someone content with riding behind (ride that)
Nigga

They come in all colors

White, black, Puerto Rican
Is that the main niggas we're speakin' about?
Wear suits and buy and sell corporations
With only one thing in mind

(Only one thing in mind)(Break it up!)

That is the destruction of the so-called radical man
By 2045

(Let's get radical)

Watch me now!

School's in the yard, digital games
When the war broke out we called your name

(What's your name?)
Everyone of color put on the front line
Holocaust Avenue, 2009

Get an education, good job who says? (say)
Fool with the gold rush drinkin' Alize
I don't play nobody that's makin' no sense today
You got your own mind, so you think it's ok (It's not ok)

Telling themselves lies, Mos Def say
Where you gonna stay, nigga

(Where you gonna stay nigga)

(Oh my God, it's the Green Mile!)

What's up y'all?
What y'all wanna do? (Talkin' about a radical man)
Ain't nobody ever lay crew no?
I could really run that computer
Make it flow (flow flow flow flow flow)
If you ain't born with it (Radical man)
Talkin' about the two and four, hit me!

Wait up
What George say., all around
Alright

We play Miles Davis, and D'Angelo
We playin' D-flat in the funk
You better act like you know
We don't care, whatever {unknown}
I'd rather know, rather know (what?)
How to be a better man

Hey!
James Brown, Chuck D. and Jimmy
Turn me up louder now
I don't think y'all hear me (I hear ya)

2045
We will stay alive
2045 (everybody now)
The flow is out of site

And the whole pop scenario is just nothin' but a dream

(A bad dream)
The day you will wake is the day you get the real cream, nigga

Radical man (Radical man)
Who got the gift, who got the plan?
Radical man (Radical man)
Who got the gift, who got the plan?

This is the funk the industry most fears
Artists getting together
In a locker board of directors
I don't think so
Nobody's running this
Let's talk about DNA, nigga

The radical man

{Spoken with crowd cheering in background}
Where will you be in 2045?
30 million people right now, are being wiped off the face of the planet by disease.
They claim they have no cure.
In the matter of a blinking eye, all of us right now can testify.
Take a stand, radical man.