Clin D'oeil

Yo, whats up this is Streethearts (sp?)
 Also known to y'all as Slim Kid Tre
 The topic for today is uh
 The influence of jazz
 Now, jazz has come a long way
 Back in the days
 There was bebop
 And now its hip hop
 Jazz was revolutionary
 And hip hop is also revolutionary
 Unlike rap
 Rap's not really getting the message across
 Like our forefathers
 Like the Gil Scott-Herons, you know
 They paved the way
 They set the pace
 They set the tone
 Like the Last Poets
 All of these are great people, great minds
 To do things to carry the torch of our ancestors
 to let us know what's really, really going on around the world
 Hip hop has definitely carried that torch in a positive way
 Rap was a vehicle for stopping the violence
 Just as jazz was back in the days
 Back in the 60s, back in the 30s
 Quincey Jones, McCoy Tyrner, Grant Green
 Wes Montgomery, Elvin Jones, Miles Davis
 Eric Gale, Phil Sanders, Freddie Hubbbard
 Billy Higgins, Jimmy Smith, Wayne Shorter
 Ahmad Jamal, Thelonius Monk – all big influences
 For what it is that we do
 And what it is that we are
 As we take our stance in music
 Jazz was also like a secret conversation
 I mean, it was a universal language
 So no matter what culture you came from
 You would still hear the music
 And feel the story even if you didn't know the words
 In hip hop
 We have to put our all into it
 So you can feel the energy coming across just the same as the saxophone player
 Who played with the same intensity and feeling
 And that's what we're all here for
 To feel that love and vibration
 To uplift the people, indeed
 So that is indeed an influence on me