[Intro: guitar feedback, crash] Swing it Knock it down [Hook: shouted, gang vocals on "knock it down"] Knock it down! Knock it down! They pay me forty an hour to bury my own town Every brick I ever loved is comin' down to the ground So swing it, motherfucker, knock it down! [Verse 1] Six a.m., hard hat, coffee in a thermos Boss hands a work order, I don't need to read the purpose Twelve-story tower on the corner by the train Same one my mama paid for with her back and with her pain Fourth floor, C, I can see it from the cab Window still got tape in an X from a storm that was bad Developer in a vest, never sweated in his life Talkin' luxury lofts with a rooftop and a price Twenty-two hundred for a studio with brick Brick they're gonna leave exposed so it looks like where we lived Ms. Delia from 2B cried into her sleeve Fifty years in that apartment and they gave her seven days to leave [Hook: shouted, gang vocals on "knock it down"] Knock it down! Knock it down! They pay me forty an hour to bury my own town Every brick I ever loved is comin' down to the ground So swing it, motherfucker, knock it down! [Verse 2] First swing, lobby, mailboxes like teeth Every little brass door spittin' paper underneath Second swing, stairwell where I had my first kiss Third swing, landing where they jumped my brother Chris Where he laughed through a bloody lip and said, "they hit like this" Every swing's a memory and every memory screams Dust in my lungs like I'm breathin' in my teens Foreman on the radio, "why the hell you slow?" I said, "that's my childhood, man, I'm sayin' bye before it goes" [Breakdown: half-time riff, gang shouts] Swing! (Swing!) Fourth floor, C Swing! (Swing!) That's me, that's me There's the kitchen where she worked two jobs and still made rice There's the doorframe with the pencil marks, my height, my brother's height Every birthday notched in graphite, eight, nine, ten, eleven His stopped at fifteen, 'cause at fifteen Chris was gone to heaven [Beat Switch: double-time drums, guitars wide open] So I climb out the cab with my boots in the rubble Foreman screamin' I'm in trouble, man, I grew up in trouble Up the broke stairs, four flights in the air Kick through the plaster, there's the doorframe, still there Pull it with my hands 'til the nails come screamin' Six feet of pine with my whole damn family breathin' Carry it down on my shoulder through the dust and the crowd Dev in the vest says, "that's company property," loud I said, "come and take it, then," and he looked at the wood Then he looked at my face, and he understood [Hook: shouted, gang vocals on "knock it down"] Knock it down! Knock it down! They pay me forty an hour to bury my own town Every brick I ever loved is comin' down to the ground So swing it, motherfucker, knock it down! [Verse 3: one guitar, then full band slams] Back up in the cab, put the doorframe in the seat Seatbelt across the pencil marks, my brother next to me Then I swing like a hammer on the devil's front door Fourth floor, C, ain't nothin' there no more Let it fall, let it fall, they can build it how they like The measurements of us are ridin' home with me tonight [Final Hook] Knock it down! Knock it down! They can buy the dirt, but they can't buy the sound Took the only thing that mattered off the fourth floor, now Swing it, motherfucker, knock it down! [Outro: feedback, one last crash] Fifteen Still the tallest
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