Dave Chappelle Lyrics

[Chorus]

I don't want to be famous
Cuz that shit will kill you
I don't want to be famous
Cuz that shit will kill you

[Verse One]

The money, power, or fame
Or how many people be screamin' your name
Doesn't equate to success or freedom to me
I just wanna live and let my art breathe
I just wanna be. I just wanna be. I just wanna to be-be
I just want to be free

What happened to Kurt, Janis Joplin or Jimi
Miles, Coltrane, Billie Holiday, Amy Winehouse, or Whitney?
That fame shit is shifty
Call it narcissism or call it the drugs
Call it too much power or the wrong type of love

And everyone mad at Dave Chappelle
For savin' himself
I'm like, well. .
My music can't translate to money, sonny
My music is infinity. f*ck 50 million
You can't buy my dignity
They put Lupe in a bind
The Roots been low budget for a long time

Paris Hilton barley does a day
But if you a rapper they give you the max and throw the key away
Picture Talib Kweli questioned by the FBI
Listening to Stokely Carmichael and they wanna know why

I imagine all the people like John Lennon
But then I remember all the people like John Lennon:
Malcom, Huey, King, Kennedys, too many names to mention

Arizona Sheriffs and vigilantes with raw aggression

(Chorus)

I don't want to be famous
Cuz that shit will kill you
I don't want to be famous
Cuz that shit will kill you
And I don't wanna be
And I don't need to be
And I don't wanna be
And I don't need to be
But I got to feed my family

[Verse Two]

Dave Chappelle's black white supremacist hit
Kids in my class memorized the skit
Couldn't interpret what Dave was tryin' to say:
That ignorance is blind and so is hate
So they actin' all KKK, runin' the hall way all day
Yellin', “Go back to your country. White power.”

Stupid kids thinkin' racism was cool
Unaware that the Chappelle joke was aimed at you

If I blew, these fools would misconstrue
The shit that I do

You
Say it's the year of the white MC
That don't mean shit to me
I'm bi-racial homie
I ain't got no fake ID

And because I speak about race thing
I'd be the first they paint crazy

America loves Slim Shady
Cuz that's poor white American rage Kicked over music built on black American pain
And I too break free
From break beats built from the cracks and the inequality

I'm just a small town kid big city adopted
Raised into a man
Funky Finiquera where I stand
Just a lonely mestizo
Lettin' ink flow over the alchemist instrumental
I write knowin' people goin' paint me black or white
But worse come to worse my people come first
And I fight

(Chorus)

I don't want to be famous
Cuz that shit will kill you
I don't want to be famous
Cuz that shit will kill you
And I don't wanna be
And I don't need to be
And I don't wanna be
And I don't need to be
But I got to feed my family

(Verse, Three)

I never believed in such a thing as bad music
Just misguided lyrics and crap that's useless
I don't believe in white music
I don't believe in black music
I believe the fact is that black people were the first to do this
Created American music
Then the white kids started started groovin' and wanted to do the same shit
From hip hop to jazz
They called it devil music or a fad
Cuz the music was born black
But it takes both, you know
White man invents the saxophone
Oppresses black man
Black man teaches the white man how to dance
And make that motherf*ckin' horn blow, ey yo!

Don't get me wrong. I love legends like Dylan's and Lennon's
I just make objections when people say rock and roll and only white names get mentioned
What happened to Muddy, Chuck, and Kool Herc?
The ones who made that shit groove first?
Hey, I give no love to a hip hop Elvis
Black or lilly white, wearin' a block of ice in the summer time
You the type to get held over the balcony by a Suge Knight
Stars fall
Vanilla ice
Yikes

And Hip Hop ain't that black and white

The truth is
The first b-boys were Puerta Ricans
And you can't get no Run DMC without out no Rick Rueben
And he's Jewish. So don't ask me what the f*ck I'm doin'

(Chorus)

I don't want to be famous
Cuz that shit will kill you
I don't want to be famous
Cuz that shit will kill you
And I don't wanna be
And I don't need to be
And I don't wanna be
And I don't need to be
But I got to feed my family
Credits

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