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Forward, In Harmony

by Write Colour

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1.
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "forward, in harmony" i awoke from a shallow sleep with formed fist streams of thought groove where i wallowed in dreams with increased acknowledgment, seeped in confidence wading in the delta of day i’m not even sure what college is and these words have me worried the way that they frame it is blurry i lose out finding myself in a hurry what’s another piece of paper? my work will make the world a better place before i put it on my resume culture and race we’re supposed to celebrate but one degree of separation ensures the world will never change it’s ever-strange how the circle gets smaller and still doesn’t spin right the shadows of our cities get taller we sprawl into the last wild places few and far are the smiles on faces, buried this one in a book piles of pages and life’s all about milestones and phases so you gotta dig the message trees eat our messes and turn them to color nourishing life as well as wonders to discover seven generations full of brothers—i’m trying to do right by them but how can i once the pipeline’s in? put your hands in the dirt. forget green-washin it’s time to make noise, there is no other option get real: everything is not copacetic we shall not continue without a land ethic progress is opposite technology traps what good is that without a blank spot on the map? preservation means timeless, everyday’s Earth day we need to rewrite the world in the worst way so hear that story unfold it’s two brothers making music from opposite sides of the continent and toward a goal different coasts, still full speed ahead and well fed off the pirated jams that we chop and re-blend i’ve said a lot already, i used to suck it was 04 and comments were saucy like a pot of spaghetti i popped the top off the plot but the bottle was empty at twenty-four there’s still no one dropping confetti but it’s autumn nights the beats get delivered hard in case you ignore the writes like cops with wicked wedgies and leathermans i’m better than the me of 2010, i reinvent and still intent on being diligent, i never mill around i got the will and wit to fill in the script with intelligent quips and relevant blips say to hell with the rips—i’m not gonna buy that this is occupyRAP and i’m still in a tent one-hundred percent of my music’s an ill-legitimate child of self-improvement fluent how do you do it? practice. i’m holdin hopes high for a white nature-nut feel the ones who paint it black are steady rolling stones uphill under my thumb is the pen i get the power from loud but the sound’s unplugged—figure that one you show love, i give it back when i’m done i turn my back to the grid and take a step toward the sun forward, in harmony
2.
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "castles in air" what if i was never heard? an unsound like absurd advice bright panache for its own sake i’m a lonely bird of paradise searching through green stratums my eyes are a pair of dice, flitting—never landing on the same place twice the verve that i put into the verse is highly rehearsed but only as good as you feel at your worst or you won’t listen still rewind like a fishing reel and see me trade in my equipment for a studio apartment in mission hill made my pilgrimmage to the chilled limits of the blank abyss and documented the excursion like the journals of robert scott will i reinhabit this spot? probably not ‘cause the door to equilibrium is oddly unlocked bet on a long shot and squandered the flock looking at the big picture, thought: this gotta be cropped true depression wore a villian’s mask my approach: Dylanesque shelter from the storm is positively hip hop slinging science on writer’s block for twenty-twelve written as the year when the pillar of money fell in gold we trust but ‘forced worship stincks in God’s nostrils’ i cast into the wilderness like roger williams was and stumble on a providence impossible to fudge denouncing practices that put sea otters into sludge crying over spilled oil, drilling for our well-being contemplating hell freezing stay away from me unified when the two colored keys no longer stand apart but rather bounce arm in arm and melt your candle heart bold and brazen as a vandal’s mark still we offer up the message in the soft hands of art as new man embarks upon lands to charter i’ve learned it’s smarter to be a part instead of a prince i’ve worked hard from the start and ever since i shock the pessimists with stark benevolence i examine myself in famine and health and i know fear lurks in camo with stealth but i never fall for its sport for i shape the game like a mayan ball court within i built a higher walled fort ‘case the fire roared forth kept an eye toward the source of the iron horse exhaust no service, couldn’t decline the call of the north evaded the sprawl and the fall of the front porch stay away from that field, suburbia! get your hamster tunnels out of here, suburbia! we do not want your styrofoam meat, flammable produce or zero percent juice all-natural is hardly a truce quit standing on that bison’s grave, suburbia! move!
3.
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "you are what you are" thirty-three hundred years after pharaoh Akhenaten praised the sun god we rally up for the solar revolution a hip hop – Planet stewardship confluence back to the heart, back to the land—it’s congruent a bright future’s no place for crepuscular rhythm feel the beat, far from discreet; a thumpin collision wall street can’t corrupt the vision they sign the checks but you sign the petition because (you are) the youth that’s gonna reinvent simple and excel outside of microsoft windows so what’s the word? everything but mum, we are anything but dumb hardships unanchored, close friends become chum corporate world’s not swell, they are for whom we toll the bell in 2012 when the nots become undone this is music for the movement motivation for the new beat generation before the dust settles before the smoke bites the dust before the angels descended from the heavens with a message to your brain from your soul from afar you should already know—you are what you are that little voice of truth up in your ear, hear me? it’s that fire in your belly, don’t tell me that you don’t feel me and if it ever seems like you’ve roamed a little far no matter where you go, you are what you are it’s that writing on the wall up in the hall, see me? it’s that flow before the falls then the fall frees me you can try to pick and choose but the truth is in your heart no matter what you do, you are what you are a couple owls chill above me in a cottonwood unimpressed by a talon-less two-legged idealist that accepts the word waste and it feels good to get the bird from nature in any moment i’m a leading candidate for atonement i scramble on the street and i fill the air with dinosaurs rollin round on tree blood from the amazon in grasses from the far east and all of it assembled by hands i’ll never greet i repeat and seemingly ramble on the beat stretch the rules of rhyme so i can handle what i seek i leave the keys and ponder the universe on foot knowing every small step i take’s a quantum leap who’s about to put the science out there? them? no. not them? hmm, you’re gettin warmer like a polar bear they’ll rap about their ice until the poles are bare suddenly burst and we’ll feel it indirectly like a solar flare we listen to a second-hand account about here from speakers over there they cloud up the air between them and us with heady dust sick beats bring us close, choking off their secondhand quotes welcome the antidote, first hand anecdotes that reflect the public sentiment can those panelist votes i am what i am and it’s what i wrote it’d be a drag to hear me blowin butt-smoke, so i don’t
4.
The Pain 04:05
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "the pain" ‘read this note’ says the man in the black coat wearing an angst that was born on a packed boat the words gush from a drowned mouth in the deep end he needs the root of all evil to absolve his demons his hackneyed semblance screams feel me! trying to get out of philly with the firm proof he hides below his sleeves, and can’t leave in this bus station he’s by the bathroom door pacin ‘come inside, i’ll show you the scars’ i tell him no need, ‘cause they’re apparent his odd humility is fervent a train slithers by looking like the plumed serpent his pain solidifies what we confide with blind observance we follow the lead who lead us astray i offer charity without knowing for what i just paid blamed if i enable him to live another day rebels walk in dark clothes at night and get enlightened in the headlights till they’re dead right if only i could be a fly on the face of a malnourished child or a stray in a cage third rock from the sun, third world from the treasure the weakest parts feel the most pressure the indirect effects we don’t measure connect paychecks with sex for quick pleasure men without knowledge of self stand on the edge with no self-esteem toes dangled off the heath ledger as a party jumps off in every manhattan night club that chic in the head after slippin a small pill in her plastic couple of creeps rob an old lady of her leather personal information is stolen from your e- male chauvinists, females aborting kid’s networks are full of shots of the virus i keep an image of a safe world on the back side of my eyelids trying to find silence while inside of a mindless world full of sirens a man shivers in the cold of a burlington night as girls strut by mockingly in skirts and faux fur i lock eyes with him and he looks at me as though he watched me sleep and heard me utter revealing words sudden i feel the urge to feel nothing people flinch as i expel this soul sickness of the rich we rake in gifts and blow wishes off a fat cake throw out clothes and set traps in the rat race grace covers with a face full of plaster and paste girls sit in empty tubs and try to bleed the ugly out of them children fill their bodies at a faster pace parents pray but these predators they can’t outrun landscapes get defaced by disaster and waste it’s the duty of this album to ask how come? a salutary eighty years for seven billion skyscrapers, more penicillin
5.
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "reflection overture" lower me down to yesterday there was a moment when sneaking out of bed got easier i used to sleep with an arm under and back around her toward the end we faced where we headed— in different directions i’d abandon my post unnoticed when the beckoning sun of a new day shined through the gated window i’d grab sara’s leash and she’d pop her head up from under the covers (laugh) what a friend. she never cared where i was going, she just knew she wanted to go there too as far as love—that was a story we never finished i don’t know what i miss now i must have missed it somewhere along that walk north looking deep down off the edge of today, the memories are soft it’s just a long fall to get to them i could veer from it but what good is a light if it doesn’t dance spontaneously? or moths don’t fly into it and disintegrate? i cool my face in the stream of consciousness the moss on the banks carved by ferocious flood waters is as soft as the love we once knew and watches things come and go as i do now and saves all it has become from washing away maybe it should send it off around the bend
6.
As I Reflect 04:07
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "as i reflect" there are dogs on the loose, ladies beware! i need to wholly remove myself just to be here but let’s be clear inhibitions get fuzzy as piss gets clearer regard slips further and groins grow nearer i choose a player then i look in the mirror before i go out any trace of me? (nope) good—i’m ready now sighs have been scarce and so i’m on the prowl can’t see the moon from here but i’m tryin’a get my howl on i sway, dip, gulp, swallow my nerves that resurface while world follows its urge free, free birds that really sing delerious, camoflauged by a stronger proof corporeally curious a legend of the night born out of a daytime doodle many options, very little scruples you’re riding that high horse into the ground, partner! acting like you want to be your own martyr electron drums, auto-tune OUT and too much bass for the girls to be insulted proper friday 10pm: lost cause walks in floatin extra care on his outfit to make it look like he didn’t care at all so smooth. joe cool. alpine attitute (climate change will get him, too) i chose myself now i’m singled out memories are bubbles of the past and i see you’ve had your fingers out you are no longer all i think about just a mere silhouette of lengthwise warmth and pillow indent i figured i had bellowed my intent with deep sacrifices, committments tried to see the city for it’s cultural enrichment but became deficient in the nutrients provisioned in a pitched tent which meant i had to sally where that itch went someone got rich off my rent—still don’t regret a cent spent or any other sense i put into it i stayed cool like an Inuit i reminisce on how our first impetus rescinded to impotent the wrenched predicment became perhaps a bit superfluous drenched in brisk nervousness, i couldn’t resist picturing myself elsewhere and there were no yells there i hate the fact that we couldn’t let our immature love break through but it takes two i often wonder in shades of blue about everywhere i wouldn’t have gone had i stayed with you we never came true the shallow waters of the mainstream and it’s fortifying banks do not seem to afford me with steam, i dig below it a feral rap/poet with a shoulder to the wheel got respect ‘cause i told ‘em how i feel cut the crap clear open at the heel twenty scores tunes ago occupied a mindstate—no buhloones to blow just began doing shows, try to summon up flows that run like a gooey nose as i jog memory lane acidic fog weathers the plane i sought trains of thought follow depressions of species that left us green-thumbed sketches of the precious tense commense in breaths of newness (without hubris) head never in a cumulus puff ‘cause i do not accumulate more stuff assume i ain’t warmed up i keep it quaint sho ‘nuff, discussion on top percussion placid conversations about conservation forever mild, technical, calm communication free, over the counter culture interpretation melodic jubilation incompatible with rap for capital and those who bite the plastic apple now i’m full
7.
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "where are you?" my, where feet will fall between the school bus and half house dumbed-out was cool to us trying to fit the pants of men way in advance young as people with the world in their hands but old enough to be okay with a duller brain an outlook full of rain, a mouthful of shameless mimicry nameless actors aimed at backwards flames and sacked herbs, burned in the chains revealing the charred remains of a stainless pedigree the folks they let it be, no home get fed and flee afloat but heavy, into the smoke they settle but the smoke won’t settle so the folks don’t meddle now the whole bunch is lost and tossed around the trip until the one with the wheel exits or flips when you’re driven by the light at the end of a pipe even your best friends are never right or anywhere in sight they’re in life—where are you? the founding of the cool guy, the rift between you and i in twelfth grade i went to high school you came to school high slippin’ on a smooth slide, instead of takin’ notes in the classroom it was tokes in the bathroom and jokes made the day zoom by your guiding light was like the five senses to the mind providing bright ascensions to the sky your supply quenches the bind first your mouth then your nose now into your vein in just two years time it’s all fun until your friends get hurt we should have been more alert we could have been better friends, we should made our amends why did we laugh at his blacked-out ass when he was practically passed-out and he cracked that glass? because i ask now means there’s something i regret trouble i cannot accept a postcard town with ugly secrets where hobbies turn to habits athletes to addicts, and i’ve had it when my friend made the front page of the paper for sellin’ prescription pills he picked from his parents i took it personal i’m not anti-pot, i know it’s perilous pull is personal gateway, safe today put some potent products on your palette, pal you won’t find a way out the gate pinched potential—pull, poof, point proven high is low, beer is eye-level packs of pathogens purposely placed in close proximity to where you pay a poor price for impaired pulmonary performance poison takes the path that’s porous, pretty pictures implore us i still remember your first party: your friends were calling you a pussy and you were pounding PBRs and they were pokin’ at your patience ‘til the pressure made you painless and your puke made you famous—now you’re playing the part there’s no pill for an ill that paralyzes the will, it’s still an issue you’re still alive but we all miss you
8.
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "the bright side" i heard the voice seven years ago now and it told me to disseminate this unique sound turned the radio off and haven’t tuned in since compass dial pointed north and steadfastly retreating on a warming globe used to care about footwear but always rapped for kicks not a way to get rich or some slick wardrobe simply medicating my mind and motivating the mass with melodies from earlier times and a myriad of smeary pads whorled into patterns like painted trillium put me In my element like Indium i’m so thankful to be young in the era of the sun-lit putsch remember me as the one who woke up remember us as the ones who won’t budge the generation of the grit and the grunge grandchildren of Gaia, too grounded to hold a grudge toward our greed-stricken godfathers too great to ever give up what is borne in the dark must be tender and deep i find the light, be it late, heavy or night there’s a thin line between demented and inventive if i ever told you anything i meant it that moment of truth stirs up before it settles i puncuate the paper, my clothes all disheveled aimed high behind the blinds where i try to hide awakened on the bright side now I'm twenty-four, million words still not about a buck—just trying to get myself heard Dear Mr. John Muir, in a life of peaks and valleys why’s the flow so dam impure? i never told you this but i’m a little unsure this passion that i put forth is not behind my every step i wish my mind would let me rest i wish the concept of healthy Earth wasn’t second best i wish i’d never digress for this faulty sake of interest like dig this and get into the groove of your carbon footprint anything that could blow should vent and my paper isn’t green so i’m hardly spent here i go again but this is why the story has an open end why i chew my nails and pens instead of the butt end of a cigarette i never told you this either— i’m scared of all the chemicals i ate for twenty years of all the things that go inside my ears and where that weight goes what breaks down, and the mouth is the exit hole no waste and no control without a face whereabouts unknown, emotion unshown future written over one-of-a-kind lines of a palm and read of the screen of a phone never alone, a pre-grown tree in a mulched bed for a bleak home so i roam where nerves are intense ‘cause i’d rather know my enemy outright than have to suspect 300 friends
9.
Not Affluent 03:50
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "not affluent" hop off the bus, drop my books—now it’s time to learn i put in work for the credit that is hard to earn and dwell in realms not connected by a hallway i thought about this beat all day when i was younger i was cool with buildin blubber as i hit the couch thinkin ‘bout a pretty chic and how to unzip the blouse then i plugged the headphones in and took the mic out its pouch and though i went on hiatus i was never in doubt ‘cause i am dead without this outlet i let out the rage and learned reliance was the key to get out the cage stuck harmony and harm on the same page and grew into my stage name before i hit the tender age of twenty think i care at all about money? that’s funny i’ve never known dead presidents to uphold your rights i say whatever and rhyme on straight loops, fuck it i’m gonna pour it on before i kick the bucket fresh brew, thick and unfiltered a lyricist who be in the wilderness—it’s got you bewildered revitalized 4/4 time, this is two brothers coming from the right angle complementing one another and though the net cost of life piles up we serve this racket simply for the love oh well, another story to tell rapper-guy took a trip and settled right where he fell in grade school i never really learned to type very well so discover what’s under that funky-colored marble cover i’m a lover of wonder and what’s a big dharma bummer is going against the grain like a saw cut through hardwood lumber so i try to go with the flow the difference is i make my own flow and travel below in the muck and i’m the only one here. aw shucks...but i open ears so if you’re looking for a big-faced watch full of rocks you should watch someone else rap ‘cause this is not that this is a rebellious ploy to bring hip hop back how are we doing with that? with no allusion to a fortune or fame we join those rich in zeal to end the corporate reign get in tune, i’m so down i turn the track blue so i wrote this while i’m walkin’ down the avenue with rhymes so wild they call my notepad the jungle book speakin’ my mind is just an itch i gotta scratch like baloo the bear necessities are all i can approve i ignore the glitz ‘cause my interests are not in orbit boredom makes absorbent kids a market they haven’t got a clue ‘cause they don’t make an app for it i’ma slap corporate execs, get the poor people vexed put pens in their hands and watch the corners connect a complex intellect perplexed by a world that breaks up in a text what is love? whoa, hold up. this is when i blow up get real uncool and throw up this cluttered-mind-muttered-rhyme flow stuff hop on a bus and head left get high off of beats and go deaf ‘cause i don’t know my limits and sometimes i forget to take a breath
10.
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "heavy wings that fly" it’s hard just being you you gotta be that everyday your best friends hate when you’re not happy you need a reason why you feel this way, come on, explain you have to be the one in the rain with a big smile on his face well, the weight’s just too much now the sad clown’s out sick today the worst part about being a loner is that no one looks for you they finally respect you they finally let you be they are the noise and you are where the birds go when it’s too windy to stare into space making darker what you cannot erase behind-the-screen love is not what i be about i gotta be twice the man just to even out if she knew me like i know me would i even doubt? i doubt it, as i commit to go the steeper route i use the melody to court her so i puff it out walk by her door so many times that i lost count tossed out letters that returned to sender, feeling off-centered know i’d offer much better if i sprung from comfort with the heavy wings that fly whoa whoa whoa whoa and as i turn the page i turn away i felt it wasn’t worth it just to turn into a person that i’d barely know and probably grow to hate but smiles motivate i was fallin’ for her coolness—she was not your average snowflake it’s got my mind open late wish that i could just take it slow and wait but these feelings that i harbor make a friendship overweight we’d sink before we even get off shore, i’m sure if i wait it out then i’ll be okay tellling her now would just make it worse i’m not living up to who i’m supposed to be but who i am now is the one that works i’m sort of old-fashioned i mean old like before we were scored on our fashion before computer comments destroyed the compassion before the future’s promise was just what these children could imagine i’ll forgo the super conquest to see the world over to share a walk with a woman that i won over leave prints that connect the dots of the web add one or two to our nest and all stroll forward though this puts me on a flimsy limb without a choice i find the confidence within without a choice i find the confidence within myself and it helps
11.
The Musician 04:47
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "the musician" i thumb into the atmosphere with sounds that grab for your ears without retort, most my cohort is grabbing for beers but with determination i bend my lyrics 'cross the sky like mental murmuration i earned the space in which i occupy healthy with my pal mic new democracy—was does it sound like? traipse on a wooded path, but march on the pavement with a look of wrath 'cause they want to frack fractions for a feuldal half with their crooked math a fuel source to get us nowhere; a pipe with more oil for us we bore holes into the boreal forest and blow it out like there's no other way we need it like the weekend needs another day i'm hip to their gimmicks but immanently hypocritic critical of myself and what i'm worth; my pulse echoes that of the earth's an artist is what he's into—alive in his work i lift the shade on the pain and you see through the window this isn’t what i dreamed about when i was younger the time is right now—hush the rain with the thunder either get in the groove or get out the way music is the way i make a change, watch the bodies sway now i have a lot to say this won’t be the one that got away—i promise me that come all, listen. this jazz brew is what the casual listener’s missin’ it’s audible ambition for a perennial mission sure is, and now i write to the beat with one earphone in zonin'—is the musician right here? pen alighted on sequestered carbon with an arm in too many things and two helpings of hands, lose my stress with my fingernails have an idea, but can't decide where i'm gonna put it doubt provides fear with a place to hide self-confidence mantra be: ‘you're good this way’. like i'm riding shotgun and my side's clear driven—i am what i create: a [beat] feet happily flap on a mountain like Japhy and i am what i'm into, litter go-getter check the weather, collect feathers reflect on whether i made the best so i can get better the musician—a voice for an instrument but intrinsically hip with simple scripts that fit, listen so i stir it up the mumbling musician’s on a quest to bring the seed to fruition hey how’s being an environmentalist a distinct recognition? ‘cause if you love the planet say HELL YEAH right on, and as i write on i wonder why i flip the kitchen light on in the middle of the day when the sun’s out how far have we swayed in this game we have to play? i turn my music up but now instead i turn my energy the same way
12.
13.
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "write on" i tell him meet me in the morning i’ll be up with the birds eatin raisin bran yawnin dip in my brush to paint the tree tops in autumn gettin a rush like everything i see is awesome click to mtv on the tube, there’s kids swarmin tryin’a be cool just like the Earth ‘cause it’s warmin we used to play hoops at the church, my friend’s mormon now i use beats to retreat—they give me shelter when it’s stormin my teacher said spell the word right ‘else you don’t get credit so i imbed it in my head, memorize it then forget it from one to the next second eventually reappears as a sentence in this record but if i never said it i bet it just wastes effort rememberin letters instead of a better-placed method thinkin ain’t certain; certain is the searchin so get outside and live it up—quit workin whether you’re creepin on facebook or got your face in a book notice that it differs in the space between the front door and yourself, full throttle your health it’s cliche—don’t follow your dreams send ‘em threats, stalk ‘em day and night ‘til they know you’re here to fight for your rights and your light ‘cause you can’t imagine what would happen if they turned up absent you’d be absent minded in a world where degrees are gold, that’s your path to find it although perhaps math class just seems mindless they give you x, y’s unknown—like please find this i x it out then write ‘y we gotta find this?’ if i take a test, why you gotta time it? if i don’t staple my five-page paper you won’t take her even though i wasted a sunny saturday to make her? i don’t hate her, that’s just how the line swings but i’ll burn this building down if she don’t give me my stapler thomas jeff—he penned ‘all men created equal’ while he owned chained people, whipped and mad feeble man is that evil the only thing we’re equal in is how we treat others like foes and not brothers we’ll sink six feet with souls that got smothered sold, lost and never resdiscovered animals will thrive and the trees will be live and big birds will fly free in the sky without thousands of jets how can i envision the demise of my own race where many are tainted like the times bonds touched homeplate? know faith, no fate—life is all that we got we know positive’s good, we know negative’s not but you need both at the basic levels of matter to form bonds we destroy ours by holdin arms pointin ‘em essentially at ourselves locked behind bars, convicted and charged that’s chemically balanced
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Travel Proem 02:33
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "travel proem"
15.
Original rap/poetry by Larry Montague. Copyright © 2012 Larry Montague. Permission required for reproduction. "the four trips" i was veiled for twenty-some-odd years shielded from the ills in the seat of my high chair listen, i never questioned if my comfort was perpetual until my first passing sight shattered all i ever knew as i traveled through town i saw a man on a bench alone—void of friends, full of regrets face wrinkled, hunched over, cold hurt people said ‘look at him, he’s old as dirt’ as i watched his hands quiver and felt my warm flesh get flush i thought: what’s the difference between us? a voice said that man is you you’ve always been one in the same same thread as the sun and the rain, i thought now the truth seems withered and worn it offered you itself when you were born the skies aligned in a curious way they came from the hills and you shunned what you heard them say you never put your faith in the words of people you trust in the river and trees to teach you the lotus and seekers of its path beseech you (me too) i chewed on this image for a little while but had sweet indulgence shoved down my throat truthfully, i didn’t much resist it and when i floated off a bit, bliss shut the lid until, on my very next sojourn, i saw a bald little girl and felt a burn—the grief that i had to learn a face too sweet, an anguish unearned i watched as the heads of the people turned like ‘poor her’ in her eyes was nothing i could picture in mine doors to a candid body designed to work fine i felt trapped, but knew i couldn’t even really feel that confined to this tenuous illusion of time, i thought stranded between cancer and the answer i began to get perturbed by the songs and the dancers an imprudent sketch seemed to mock scenes i couldn’t forget and everytime i closed my eyes, back there i went on my third tour outside the castle walls i came across a poor mother who had it all taken from her she said her son was an Indian farmer, indebted for his GMOs he watched his field recede farther so he swallowed pesticide and died owing less than i squander without bother how much food do i throw away? if i only knew a soul’d be saved, i thought the dim light turned my palace to a dungeon reflecting off the gold like it’d rather not touch it i try to push the panic away but it’s not budgin i’m not fit to suffer these woes is my presumption been given all i got, it’s left me with no gumption piled goods atop a bad foundation and it sunk in and i decided i would bury it so on my fourth trip out i hopped off the chariot pressed on the ground where the dolor was found and through the glow i could barely see a man with an aura of solidarity poised like a tree, ready for the brunt of the wind threadbare but digging deep for something to give i said nothing to him just smiled like i knew him his contemplative gaze gave me function to live through the still eyes of suffering i realized the true nature of every thing

about

“Forward, In Harmony” is a musical inquiry. It traces both a cultivation of an ethic and an experiment in environmental communication. It is a re-examination of the path and pace of our modern world. The mission of the project is to blur the feigned edges that aim to separate man from nature, sunrise from duller parts of the day, taillight red from solar red. The inspiration for the title comes from a photograph taken on a Greyhound bus south of Laramie, Wyoming, an awakening desire to combine art and science that arrived with the new year, and heady conversations with Dr. Lee Ann Sporn of Paul Smith's College who, along with Dr. Curt Stager, helped guide this project along with encouragement, support and advice.

Write Colour is an intercoastal effort to blend environmentally- and socially-conscious rap/poetry with mellow and innovative instrumentals. “Forward, In Harmony” is our first album. Thus, some of the rap/poems were written to a beat while others were penned first and then laid over an instrumental with the same vibe. Larry Montague (Fluent) lives in the Adirondack Mountains of New York and Nick Montague currently resides in San Diego, California. Thus, the entire album was created using the incredible capabilities of the internet. It was recorded in three days at Josh Kusher's home studio, dubbed The House of Kush, in Jackson, New Jersey, in March 2012.

We understand that this is a pivotal time to be alive. We understand that our planet and all of its inhabitants have reached a time of revelation, a time of dramatic and potentially dangerous change. This marks a turning point for all of us, as a whole. We need a new vision of reality, a vision that coincides with the forces transforming our world to flow together as a positive movement for social change. We acknowledge that, for the majority of listeners across the globe, the perception of hip hop is dictated by mainstream media. The lyrics of many rap artists are connected with egotism, the destruction of our planet, the degradation of women (as well as men) and the love of material objects such as cars, clothes, and money. We understand how big of an influence hip hop culture has on youth because we were deeply influenced by the artists we grew up listening to. Those who think it is naive for artists to believe their music can make a positive impact on the world are part of the population with "old minds" who continually nail down the progress of dialogue to problems. Old minds think: now that a problem is recognized, how do we solve this problem? But a person with a newly-awakened mind asks, how do we make happen what we want to see happen?
How can we move forward, in harmony?

Moving forward in harmony is the only way for the human species to persist on Planet Earth. We must follow nature’s way into the future. We do not sit upon the web that is the ecosphere, guarding it, tinkering with every joint and filament. We do not rule over it. We are but a strand that becomes less strong when the strand farthest from us is damaged. Spreading this message is the true mission of the project.

credits

released April 18, 2012

Produced by L. Montague/N. Montague.

*We do not own the rights to any samples used on this album. Because of this, we do not sell our music. Instead, we hope to honor the original artists by resurrecting their music and promoting them appropriately. For a full list of the samples used in the creation of this album, download the full album and see Bonus Item #4: Forward, In Harmony TRACKLIST.

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Write Colour New York, New York

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