stop breaking the 4th wall (Intro) (A slow, heavy, sludge-metal bassline dragging like an anchor through wet clay, punctuated by a harsh, mechanical industrial screech that sounds like a steam valve blowing wide open.) (Verse 1) Now, I’ve heard folks talk about the final judgment day like it’s some grand courtroom event up in the clouds, complete with brass horns, golden scales, and a Almighty judge who gives a damn about your petty little excuses. Let me tell you something, boys: the only judgment you’re ever gonna get is right here in the mud, delivered by a man with a blood-stained ledger and a double-barreled shotgun. I watched this whole miserable town build their little churches on stilts of stolen money, preaching charity on Sunday while they foreclose on widows by Monday noon. They wrap themselves in silk and righteousness, swearing up and down they’re going to heaven on a first-class ticket. But the river don't check your church membership, and the current don't care about your Sunday clothes. When the levee finally breaks—and it always breaks—it washes the saint and the sinner down the exact same muddy drain, tumbling together like garbage in a flash flood until there ain't nothing left to tell 'em apart! (Pre-Chorus) Raise the gates! Let the water pour! There ain't a soul worth saving anymore! Wash the varnish off the rotting wood— Nobody’s wicked and nobody’s good! (Chorus) Drop the carcass right on the levee! Let the vultures pick 'em clean and heavy! We’re riding the crest of a murder wave— From a cradle made out of an open grave! Stomp 'em down! Let the river rise! We’re blinding the truth with a million lies! Yeah, the wheel keeps turning, the boiler blows— And nobody knows where the wreckage goes! (Verse 2) It reminds me of an old steamboat captain I knew up near Cairo who swore he could outrun the river’s undertow if he just kept throwing more coal into the furnace. He burned the furniture, he burned the cargo, he even burned the spare bunks while the passengers were still sleeping in 'em, all because he couldn't bear the thought of admitting the stream was stronger than his ego. Well, the boiler finally blew its top and sent forty tons of iron and screaming flesh three hundred feet into the air. And you know what the funniest part of it was? The river kept right on rolling, smooth and indifferent, carrying a few charred splinters past the shore like nothing at all had happened. That’s humanity in a nutshell, friends—a bunch of frantic, sweating fools shoveling their own furniture into a firebox, wondering why the heat feels so damn much like hell. You can rage against the current all you want, but the water always wins, and the mud always swallows the noise. (Bridge) (Tempo drops into a sluggish, bone-crushing doom groove—guitars tuned down to absolute mud, drums pounding like heavy artillery) Shovel the coal! Feed the machine! The dirtiest trick that you’ve ever seen! You wanted a legacy? Here is your price: A frozen heart and a pair of dice! No redemption! No reprieve! Just the cold hard earth where the dying leave! BREAK THE LEVEE! DROWN THE TOWN! We’re pulling the whole damn ceiling down! (Guitar Solo / Heavy Breakdown) (A blistering, chaotic industrial-metal guitar solo that wails like a dying siren over a relentless, militaristic double-bass assault. Pure, unadulterated auditory brutality.) (Chorus) Drop the carcass right on the levee! Let the vultures pick 'em clean and heavy! We’re riding the crest of a murder wave— From a cradle made out of an open grave! Stomp 'em down! Let the river rise! We’re blinding the truth with a million lies! Yeah, the wheel keeps turning, the boiler blows— And nobody knows where the wreckage goes! (Outro) The water’s rising over the porch. The wind just snuffed out the final torch. Mark Twain had his jokes, and the preacher his prayers... But nobody’s listening. And nobody cares. (A final, massive down-tuned chord rings out, sustaining into heavy amplifier feedback before abruptly cutting off to the sound of rushing water and absolute, crushing silence)
