NEW MUSIC: Theo3 – Youth Work
Another dope one from Theo3, over one of his favorite beats of course. This time he’s detailing his time working in the community. Actual real talk. Dope.
This is a story about how I grew up, and those who influenced me, the way I then became a youth worker and saw the EXACT same things in every neighbourhood. The second verse is dedicated to all the youth who I personally knew who got murdered in the Toronto streets. Much love to Parkdale and all my people there. Bless up.
This is the first drop from “MY FAVOURITE BEATS vol 1” and features Group Home – Up Against the Wall (Get Away Car rmx) and Shadez of Brooklyn – Change.
“I saw em him everyday, ball playin’ at the open gym, hoping to win, run to 11, then sub one of your bredrens, on those long wooden benches we’d wait, all the manden yelling. Tell em to shoot, or laughing when you got crossed and fell friends who passed through always shooting on the side hoops, little kids and the O.G.’s who would looked out for the youth. There was beats playin, the shitty rec centre speakers struggling to bump the layers that music was conveying. There were 3 or 4 girls by a table just waiting for the bravest of boys step and get nathan. In front of everybody she would carry on snotty but on the walk put her number in your phone. There were old creepers, r kellys with nice sneakers, had the young girls sprung, and the baby moms beefing, with the young divas, thinking that their man might leave em not known they all pawns in his games of deceiving. There were old heads dropping knowledge, we’d catch a gem or two, they were dropping out of college trying to get the revenue. But some things never change, no matter the age, through life’s stage turning of that new page and thats why I’m here to talk about the man thats gone clear, to talk about the youth thats gone, CLEAR.
I got arrested I’m conflicted, listen, i was dealing with a 6 o clock curfew with fucked up conditions, and I needed a job paid my old coach a visit thank God that he was with it cuz this charge it was stickin. Got my CPR certificate and first aid, and been an honorary Parkdalian since my first day. But the irony was vivid, almost like the youth at the centre were the kids that I lived with, the ones I used to chill with at Rawilson Park, ballin even when it falls into dark, chain mesh, one streetlight, all from the heart, and always one snitch neighbour so prung that they calling the law. But what I saws what I’m seein, there must be a reason why the place that I be in only change with the seasons see the alpha male, with followers that be proud as hell, to be associated with a higher power scale. There’s the athletes, the nerds on the outer shell, there’s the young g’s comin in and out of jail. Then there was you. bright kid with a bright smile, big talker actin out getting quite loud. But still a beautiful soul, misplaced amongst a sea of concrete cold envisioning your goals when I came back a couple years later you were grown, expression was stone, what happened when I was gone? Well I know you never fit in, home life was twisted, mom and dad split then you dipped from your best friends. Coppin trees from the O.G.’s, graduated to the fiends startin cutting up the proceeds. Young cats gripping at sight of competition, older cats let em regulate their own block divisions so you never stood a chance, caught between to lines, not enough stripes to live, not enough not to die. All the mans knew you were destined to catch it, so calling it a surprise ‘d be madness, a victim of the streets and its tragic. your families sadness resonates through the block sewn into the hoods fabric and you’re gone… Clear. RIP
written by Theo3