Results for “street economics and hustling”

Songs

In the Street

Big Star

A deceptively simple slice of teenage boredom set to a chiming, anthemic riff, this song turns the aimlessness of small-town…

teenage boredom small-town aimlessness friendship

Mean Street

Van Halen

Mean Street is a portrait of urban confinement rendered as both trap and identity, opening Fair Warning with a bleak,…

urban poverty desperation and survival belonging despite hardship

Bells of War

Wu‐Tang Clan

A posse cut from Wu-Tang's late-90s peak that stacks dense, image-heavy verses from multiple MCs into a single show of…

group supremacy and dominance street violence as metaphor for lyrical combat Five Percenter/Nation of Gods and Earths philosophy

Street Dreams

Nas

This is Nas mapping the mythology of the drug trade from the inside, tracking a narrator's rise through dealing, the trappings…

the drug economy as a distorted American dream inevitability and fatalism in ghetto life materialism as compensation for scarcity

Fascination Street

The Cure

A pulsing invitation to a night of self-destructive escape, dressed as seduction but shot through with dread and disgust. The…

compulsion and addiction toxic intimacy escapism

Streets of Baltimore

Gram Parsons

A countrypolitan narrative song told by a man who uproots his life to satisfy his wife's craving for city glamour, only to watch…

rural-to-urban displacement the limits of sacrifice gendered domestic roles

Scott Street

Phoebe Bridgers

A wandering walk through a familiar neighborhood becomes an occasion for reckoning with a lapsed relationship, as the narrator…

awkward reunion emotional numbness nostalgia and aging

Boogie Street

Leonard Cohen

A meditation on the pull between transcendent, near-mystical intimacy and the noisy, transactional churn of ordinary life. The…

sacred vs. profane transience of ecstasy spiritual longing

Street Flash

Animal Collective

A song about the paralysis of anxious self-consciousness and the small, almost accidental relief of stepping outside. It moves…

anxiety and self-criticism domestic clutter as psychological weight inertia versus movement

Monkey Suite

Madvillain

A dense, freewheeling verse from MF Doom that piles up internal rhyme and non-sequitur imagery to sketch a self-portrait through…

identity through negation authenticity vs. costume/disguise street survival and hustling

Don't Say Nuthin'

The Roots

A dense, boastful cypher track built around a hook that doubles as street code and industry commentary: keep quiet, take what's…

street code and silence lyrical supremacy urban survival in Philadelphia

We the People....

A Tribe Called Quest

A Tribe Called Quest opens their comeback album with a song that fuses street-level survival talk with a chorus that mimics the…

racism and xenophobia economic precarity media distortion

Tearz

Wu‐Tang Clan

A grim, cautionary storytelling track built around two narrated tragedies -- a child's death from a street robbery and a…

mortality street violence consequence of recklessness

Work

Gang Starr

A boastful street-level anthem built around the double meaning of 'work' as both hustle/grind and criminal labor, delivered with…

hustler ethic street surveillance and paranoia status and reputation

C.R.E.A.M. (Cash Rules Everything Around Me)

Wu‐Tang Clan

Two verses from Raekwon and Inspectah Deck lay out parallel autobiographies of poverty, hustling, and incarceration in…

economic desperation and survival the school-to-prison pipeline urban poverty in New York

People Say

Wu‐Tang Clan

This is a posse-cut style Wu-Tang track where multiple MCs trade dense, boastful verses about street history, criminal résumé,…

street survival and generational crime materialism and excess lyrical supremacy/battle rap bravado

Earn Enough for Us

XTC

A working-class narrator pleads, almost prayerfully, for the financial stability to hold onto his relationship and growing…

economic precarity class and dignity love under financial strain

Suggestion

Fugazi

Fugazi's early anthem against street harassment is delivered from a shifting first-person voice, moving between a woman's direct…

street harassment gender and power complicity and bystander silence

Put It Right Here (Or Keep It Out There)

Bessie Smith

Bessie Smith delivers an ultimatum blues to a freeloading lover, dressing up a blunt economic demand in barnyard comedy and…

economic independence sexual and domestic reciprocity female autonomy

SpottieOttieDopaliscious

OutKast

A spoken-sung vignette of Atlanta nightlife that dissolves midway into a tender, sobering account of falling in love and…

urban nightlife and ritual romantic infatuation fatherhood and responsibility

Poor Man's Blues

Bessie Smith

A direct address from the working poor to the wealthy, this 1928 blues sides a plea for economic justice with an implicit…

class inequality economic desperation war and sacrifice

Go to Church

Ice Cube

A crunk-era posse cut in which Ice Cube and Snoop Dogg trade boasts built around a single taunt: prove your toughness or admit…

performative masculinity authenticity vs. fraudulence street credibility

Paid In Full

Eric B.

This is the title track and origin document of hip-hop's most sampled record, a first-person account of a hustler talking…

hustling and survival redemption through legitimate work the music industry as a means of escape

Atlantic City

The Band

A small-time narrator in a decaying Atlantic City weighs a desperate, half-criminal solution to his debts against a fragile…

economic desperation organized crime and violence romantic loyalty amid ruin

Nights

Frank Ocean

A two-part song that splits itself at its own midpoint, moving from a hazy, drug-fogged meditation on isolation and hustling…

isolation within closeness hustle and survival memory and nostalgia

To Hell With Poverty!

Gang of Four

A tightly wound post-punk anthem that turns economic hardship into a rallying cry, pairing a jagged, funk-inflected groove with…

economic hardship class solidarity escapism as resistance

Dirty Laundry

Danny Brown

Danny Brown turns a mundane household chore into a running double entendre for sexual and criminal grime, stacking…

sexual degradation as comedy poverty and hustling shame versus exposure

Mathematics

Mos Def

Mos Def builds a dense, statistics-driven indictment of American racial and economic injustice around the conceit of numbers,…

mass incarceration systemic racism economic inequality

Rich Man's War

Steve Earle

Steve Earle threads together three young men from three different fronts of the post-9/11 war on terror — a working-class…

class and war economic desperation propaganda vs. lived reality

Who's Zoomin' Who?

Aretha Franklin

A mid-80s dance-pop track built around a single street-slang question: who's manipulating whom in a game of seduction. Aretha…

romantic gamesmanship female agency and self-possession seduction as strategy

Jettin'

Digable Planets

A loose, groove-driven travelogue through Brooklyn, built more on atmosphere and rhythm than narrative, where the trio's verses…

place and belonging Brooklyn/borough pride Black cultural memory

Drop It Like It's Hot

Snoop Dogg

A minimalist club track built on a single triple-word command that gets reinterpreted verse to verse, moving between seduction,…

status and wealth display sexual conquest street/gang loyalty

Rite Where U Stand

Gang Starr

A hardcore posse-style threat track built around a single refrain of lethal finality: cross the speaker and you get dropped…

street violence and retaliation rap dominance/legacy industry exploitation

squabble up

Kendrick Lamar

A high-velocity West Coast flex track that turns a slang term for confrontation into a chant, stacking boasts about money, sex…

street credibility and violence wealth and material excess authenticity vs. performance in rap

Affirmative Action

Nas

This is a mafioso-rap posse cut in which Nas, alongside his Firm collaborators, trades the political/street-prophet voice he's…

organized crime as fantasy/roleplay materialism and status display loyalty and betrayal within a crew

Get Down

Nas

Nas narrates a series of street-life anecdotes and near-death encounters spanning decades of New York and West Coast gang…

cycles of violence street mythology and legacy fatalism vs. moral awakening

The Message

Nas

Nas stitches together two dense verses of violent, luxury-drenched bravado and a grim first-person shooting narrative, unified…

vigilance and mortality street violence and retaliation loyalty and betrayal

B.O.B. (Bombs Over Baghdad)

OutKast

A hurricane of a rap record built on breakneck triplet flows, gospel-choir-meets-drum-and-bass production, and a title that…

consequence and commitment excess and velocity fame and reinvention

Work It

Missy Elliott

Missy Elliott's signature single is a maximalist celebration of sexual confidence and self-invention, built on a literal sonic…

sexual agency self-invention and reinvention female solidarity and hustle

Hood Mentality

Ice Cube

Ice Cube adopts a first-person voice steeped in street bravado to expose how the mindset it celebrates is a trap, not a triumph.…

cyclical poverty education vs. street survival celebrity worship and false escape routes