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area1234/Not Silent 2002

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Enraged
Tony Montana
New York Hate Of Mind
Sick To Myself

ENRAGED

(Julio Rey)

This started off as a song about Cuba. I actually started it in 1998. I wrote a few more songs about Cuba and being Cuban in the middle and in the aftermath of the Elian Gonzalez incidents. There were some songs in English and some in Spanish (one of the Spanish ones is close to completion as far as recording is concerned). I was all set to do a whole Cuba project when 9/11 happened. It kind of put Cuba on the back burner.

I do think our country doesn’t have an obligation to police the rest of the world. But now that the attack happened, it’s time to mete out justice. And the best defeat to hand an enemy is to enable him to pick himself off the ground after the smoke clears. See Germany and Japan.

The bass is going through the Buzz Box. (01.12.02)

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I thought the guitar tone of the original “Enraged” recording was pretty lame, so I remixed the song (actually recording new guitars and vocals). Much heavier.

I redid some elements of this recording to pump up the heaviness. The rhythm guitars are all new, and most of the vocals are new as well. I kept the bass (which was recorded in 1999!), the drums, and the guitar solo. I also added some amateur turntable scratches. (06.10.02)

There’s going to be no more boredom I’m going to cut my hair
After the men, women and children falling through the air
The monsters have landed on Maple Street
The lynch mobs marching off to their defeat
If I was young I would sign up for a gun
And as it is I might just go out and buy one
Now I can understand I could just kill a man
After sending in bombs to flatten his land

We never knew a life of faith never toughed it out
Now we’re going to find out what’s it’s all about
Looking everywhere in the water in the air
The next shot is coming but from where?
You hold a gun at my kid’s head and what am I to do?
Could I wear a peace sign and to myself be true?
Oh, let the Mount of Olives tear and Wormwood poison from the air Don’t mind me don’t give me a care

I’m just enraged

“Allah” is crying as He looks down upon it all
The bridges between us will be the first to fall
Should the government have not stuck our nose everywhere?
Yes I think so but it’s too late to go elsewhere
Now we’re committed blood flowing on our soil
Now we’ve been dragged back in like Michael Corleone
And I ask the peace movement where did you go?
When Clinton sent bombers into Kosovo

For all the terrorizing I’m not too terrified
I mourn for the loss of innocent lives
I should have mourned before, our bombers filled their skies
When it was none of our business when they were out of our lives
But the lives of the guilty are there to be taken
Striking precisely with an aim unshaken
Let the computers point let the satellites fly
Let technology shield the homeland sky

I’m so enraged

Terror is but a weapon wielded by ideologues
Who have said it’s either them or us
Don’t want to fight a religion but some want to fight us
The future of freedom is starting to look tough
An enemy could be rid by becoming a friend
The lives that have suffered could be won in the end
For the thirst for freedom will never be slaked
The blood and darkness might give rise to a new day

9/11/01-10/13/01

TONY MONTANA
(Julio Rey)

I wrote a few songs having to do with Cuba during and after the Elian Gonzalez fiasco. I had the idea for this one for a while. It’s in Spanish, and the rhythm is latin.

This is one of a set of songs I’ve written on the unique perspective I have on life in the good ol’ USA as a Cuban-born US citizen. We Cubans are the only Latin minority that the liberal press mocks because we’re mostly Republicans. At the same time, there is a lot of negative baggage in our collective psyche. I tried to collect some of these thoughts in the above song, named after the main character in the 1984 film Scarface. The refrain is basically that I’m not proud to be of Tony Montana’s nationality, despite the cult hero status the character has seemed to attain in certain quarters nowadays.

I tried to bring together some influences musically: the latin percussion, the dancehall reggae rhythm, the Spanish lyrics, set against bone-crunching riffage. (06.12.2002)

Los otros latinos tienen a Ricky y Carlos Santana
Pero nosotros un italiano llamado Cara Cortada
No hay raza ni orgullo no jugamos ese juegito
Tumbamos al mundo en los ochentas con el perico
Lo merecemos por echarnos arriba al del tabacon
Es la mejor idea aunque sea ficcion
Uno compra y uno sabe lo que de verdad es suyo
Tony Montana no me da orgullo

Vivimos en un continente que parece una isla
Apollamos sus ideales a veces pagado con ira
No tengas ilusiones yo no soy rehen
La guerra que existe es mia tambien
Yo solamente soy uno que busca libertad
No me importa de donde pero nadie la quiere dar
Prefieren robar a trabajar para lo que es suyo
Tony Montana no me da orgullo

Tony Montana que jarana tragate la banana
Que tiraron americanos que vinieron de Lantana
Armaremos nuestras balsas en el rio Potomac
Echando discos de Buena Vista Social Club
Hermanos al rescate perdiendo cuarenta anos
A correr, bayameses, al ajeno extrano
Por los hijos mios y los hijos tuyos
Tony Montana no me da orgullo

12/26/00; 6/10/01; 10/04/01; 10/11/01

NEW YORK HATE OF MIND
(Julio Rey)

Another one having to do with 9/11. I call it rapcore, although some might find it a bit lightweight. I didn’t downtune and I obtained all my guitar distortion from overloading the mixing board.

I tried to create the atmosphere of vague dread here that seemed to permeate in the weeks following the terrorist attacks of September. Musically, it may be self defeating to say that I was influenced by LFO, so I won’t say it. My daughter Astrid’s toy piano was used in the choruses.  (06.12.2002)

We go about our business
Statistics on our side
We wear our flags
Filled with national pride
Babies in their cribs
Envy of the world
Jet plane circling above
It’s passed I am sure
Magazines in the mail
And nothing else
Saw a film at the mall
Still doing well
At least two counties away
At least for today
My eye’s peeled anyway
keeping muggers away

Everything seems so blind
New York hate of mind

Go to work
Show my card at the gate
Face on the wall
That disappeared on the date
His Spanish was perfect
So they say
Looking for the envelope
With his fake name
I’m an okay dad
I must explain
Not everything’s clear
Evil often gets its way
While we ail from the sickness
We try hard to forget
Such a blessed existence
We may realize it yet

10/14/01

SICK TO MYSELF
(Julio Rey)

The events of 9/11 from another perspective. I tried desperately to sound like a live band here.

I’m probably happiest with this recording out of these new ones I’ve posted. It’s a glorious sloppy mess. I even played a real guitar solo.

The words are basically me owning up to the fact that I’ve been mad enough at certain institutions that I would not have mourned too hard if a 757 had crashed into their facilities… (06.12.2002)

If the plane had crashed
Into the right kind of clinic
Or island government seat
Hello cynic

If the wrong makes it right
If the black makes it white
If the might takes a bite
If the left turns it right

I think I’m sick to myself

Nine one one
Could it be in everyone?
I fear in my lies
What a thing to realize

11/08/01; 06/06/02