[Intro: Maracatu male lead, booming call over thundering alfaia drums] Bora, nação! Hear the wood Bora, nação! [Verse 1: Maracatu male lead, riding the alfaia thunder] I was twelve and I was skinny as the rope around the drum When I walked up to Mestre Zé and asked to carry one He looked me up and down and laughed so hard he dropped his hat Said, "Boy, the drum weighs more than you, now how you gonna do that" Gave me shakers, gave me abê, put me way back in the line Said, "The alfaia's for the heavy men, come back another time" So I tied a sack of sand up to a rope around my neck Climbed the hill up in Olinda every mornin' like a wreck [Hook: Maracatu male lead, full band, alfaia thunder] I'm in a whole different weight class, oxente, look at the strap Hundred twenty pounds of boy and forty pounds of thunder on my back Skinniest kid in the nation got the biggest drum in the pack I'm in a whole different weight class and I'm never givin' it back [Breakdown: Maracatu male lead, alfaia wall, every drum in the nation hitting the same stroke at once] Bora! Wood! Bora! Rope! Bora! Skin! Bora! Iron! Every stroke is a shoulder Every shoulder is a lion [Verse 2: Maracatu male lead, gonguê ringing, caixa cracking] Fifteen, Carnival Sunday, Biu breaks his ankle on the stairs And the biggest drum in Recife's sittin' by the empty chairs Forty pounds of carved-out trunk, the goatskin tight as stone And every heavy man in the nation's suddenly on the phone So I walk up to the big one and I bend and I don't ask Throw the strap across my shoulder like I'm pullin' on a mask And I stand, and nobody's laughin', not a single man in here Mestre Zé is in the doorway with his hat up off his ear [Hook: Maracatu male lead, full band, alfaia thunder] I'm in a whole different weight class, oxente, look at the strap Hundred twenty pounds of boy and forty pounds of thunder on my back Skinniest kid in the nation got the biggest drum in the pack I'm in a whole different weight class and I'm never givin' it back [Verse 3: Maracatu male lead, thundering, abê shakers rattling] Down the Rua da Aurora with the king and queen ahead Underneath the parasol, the crown, the gold, the red I'm the front line, I'm the thunder, I'm the skinniest in sight Got the heaviest drum in the nation and I swing it day and night Every stroke I lay into the skin, the windows shake the street And the skinny kids on balconies are drummin' with their feet Oxente, heavy isn't what you weigh, it's what you're willin' to lift And I been liftin' since I'm twelve, now watch the whole street shift [Final Hook: Maracatu male lead, full band, every alfaia pounding] I'm in a whole different weight class, oxente, look at the strap Hundred twenty pounds of boy and forty pounds of thunder on my back Skinniest kid in the nation got the biggest drum in the pack I'm in a whole different weight class and I'm never givin' it back [End]
