[00:00.00]"N.Y. State of Mind"
[00:01.24]Yeah, yeah
[00:04.45]Ayo, black, it's time, word (Word, it's time, man)
[00:07.74]It's time, man (Aight, man, begin)
[00:12.01]Straight out the ******* dungeons of rap
[00:14.83]Where fake ****** don't make it back
[00:19.48]I don't know how to start this ****, yo now
[00:23.02]Rappers, I monkey flip 'em with the funky rhythm I be kickin'
[00:25.99]Musician, inflictin' composition of pain
[00:28.97]I'm like Scarface sniffin' *******
[00:30.88]Holding an M16, see with the pen I'm extreme, now
[00:34.44]Bullet holes left in my peepholes
[00:36.54]I'm suited up in street clothes
[00:37.78]hand me a nine and I'll defeat foes
[00:39.89]Y'all know my steelo with or without the airplay
[00:42.49]I keep some E&J, sitting bent up in the stairway
[00:45.40]Or either on the corner betting Grants with the cee-lo champs
[00:48.51]Laughing at baseheads tryna sell some broken amps
[00:51.26]G-packs get off quick, forever ****** talk ****
[00:53.92]Reminiscing about the last time the Task Force flipped
[00:56.68]****** be running through the block shootin'
[00:59.44]Time to start the revolution, catch a body, head for Houston
[01:02.29]Once they caught us off-guard, the Mac-10 was in the grass and
[01:05.16]I ran like a cheetah with thoughts of an assassin
[01:08.20]Pick the Mac up, told brothers, "Back up," the Mac spit
[01:11.01]Lead was hittin' ******, one ran – I made him backflip
[01:13.72]Heard a few chicks scream, my arm shook, couldn't look
[01:16.73]Gave another squeeze, heard it click, "Yo, my **** is stuck"
[01:19.53]Try to cock it, it wouldn't shoot, now I'm in danger
[01:22.19]Finally pulled it back and saw three bullets caught up in the chamber
[01:25.10]So now I'm jetting to the building lobby
[01:27.60]And it was full of children probably couldn't see as high as I be
[01:30.82](So what you sayin'?) It's like the game ain't the same
[01:32.77]Got younger ****** pulling the triggers bringing fame to their name
[01:35.88]And claim some corners, crews without guns are goners
[01:38.84]In broad daylight, stickup kids – they run up on us
[01:42.36]45's and gauges, Macs, in fact
[01:44.66]Same ****** will catch you back-to-back, snatching your cracks in black
[01:47.82]There was a snitch on the block getting ****** knocked
[01:50.72]So hold your stash 'til the coke price drop
[01:53.28]I know this crackhead who said she's got to smoke nice rock
[01:55.89]And if it's good, she'll bring you customers in measuring pots
[01:58.80]But yo, you gotta slide on a vacation, inside information
[02:02.41]Keeps large ****** erasin' and their wives basin'
[02:04.96]It drops deep as it does in my breath
[02:07.12]I never sleep, cause sleep is the cousin of death
[02:10.02]Beyond the walls of intelligence, life is defined
[02:13.19]I think of crime when I'm in a New York state of mind
[02:16.05]New York state of mind
[02:20.20]New York state of mind
[02:23.16]New York state of mind
[02:25.57]New York state of mind
[02:27.01]Be having dreams that I'm a gangsta, drinking Moets, holding Tecs
[02:30.08]Making sure the cash came correct, then I stepped
[02:33.15]Investments in stocks, sewing up the blocks to sell rocks
[02:36.55]Winning gunfights with mega-cops
[02:38.56]But just a ***** walking with his finger on the trigger
[02:41.31]Make enough figures until my pockets get bigger
[02:44.47]I ain't the type of brother made for you to start testin'
[02:47.23]Give me a Smith & Wesson, I have ****** undressin'
[02:50.04]Thinking of cash flow, buddha and shelter
[02:53.09]Whenever frustrated, I'm a hijack Delta
[02:55.50]In the PJ's, my blend tape plays, bullets are strays
[02:58.37]Young ******* is grazed, each block is like a maze
[03:01.36]Full of black rats trapped plus the Island is packed
[03:03.93]From what I hear in all the stories when my peoples come back, black
[03:06.83]I'm living where the nights is jet-black
[03:09.35]The fiends fight to get crack, I just max, I dream I can sit back
[03:12.35]And lamp like Capone, with drug scripts sewn
[03:15.16]Or the legal luxury life, rings flooded with stones, holmes
[03:18.51]I got so many rhymes, I don't think I'm too sane
[03:20.78]Life is parallel to Hell but I must maintain
[03:22.88]And be prosperous, though we live dangerous
[03:25.99]Cops could just arrest me, blaming us, we're held like hostages
[03:29.40]It's only right that I was born to use mics
[03:32.26]And the stuff that I write is even tougher than dykes
[03:35.16]I've taken rappers to a new plateau, through rap slow
[03:37.97]My rhymin' is a vitamin held without a capsule
[03:40.79]The smooth criminal on beat breaks
[03:43.35]Never put me in your box if your **** eats tapes
[03:46.15]The city never sleeps, full of villains and creeps
[03:49.11]That's where I learned to do my hustle, had to scuffle with freaks
[03:52.01]I'm an addict for sneakers, 20's of buddha and ******* with beepers
[03:54.67]In the streets I can greet ya, about blunts I teach ya
[03:58.09]Inhale deep like the words of my breath
[04:00.24]I never sleep, cause sleep is the cousin of death
[04:03.09]I lay puzzle as I backtrack to earlier times
[04:06.16]Nothing's equivalent to the New York state of mind
[04:09.36]New York state of mind
[04:13.13]New York state of mind
[04:16.09]New York state of mind
[04:18.75]New York state of mind