Tona - Triple Crown (feat. Shad & Drezus)

In Our Headphones

KEXP

Music, Music Commentary

4.4 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 2 December 2022

⏱️ 4 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Tona - Triple Crown (feat. Drezus & Shad) a 2022 single on District Entertainment.

Toronto rapper Tona has been churning out a massive amount of high-level, collaborator-heavy music for years now and received the coveted Juno Award for Best Rap Recording in 2015. Recently he dropped GE20, the follow-up to 2021’s Good Energy, which sees Tona hone in on optimistic thoughts during the most pessimistic scenarios and how they can affect your health.

“Good Energy does not mean you ignore life's less pleasant situations, just means that you approach unpleasantness in a more positive and productive way,” reads the Bandcamp description for the record. And nothing brings better energy than collaborating with talented friends. Our Song of the Day, “Triple Crown,” features Rwandan-Canadian rapper Shad and Calgary-based indigenous artist Drezus trade the mic to speak on their various perspectives. But, as Tona states in his opening verse, it’s, “For all people.”

This is what he had to say about the song:

"This record came about from a conversation of truth, our truths. Featured artists Shad & Indigenous lyricist Drezus have always been advocates for speaking their truths about equality and freedom the same way I do with my content. The fight against racism in Canada, the U.S. and abroad is far from over. The Black community has been grieving for the Black lives lost due to police brutality, racial inequality, systems inflicting trauma, historical injustice and the many injustices faced daily for a long time as well as the indigenous people. There are intense feelings of helplessness, anger and emotional pain. It might be uncomfortable for those not affected by race, but the dialogue must continue to stay open to allow room for responsiveness and not reactionary tactics. All of these emotions are captured on this record produced by The Kount."

Watch the self-directed video for “Triple Crown” and read the full post at KEXP.org.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Yeah, yeah, it's for my people, for all people, yeah, look, ah,
0:19.5	Traders are unintelligent black man, antiquated thoughts from the 60s, and I come back, eh,
0:23.8	Ramoree's in every time I lift my black hand, in certain rooms who won't even let me
0:27.4	do it until I tap dance, so I could go a drop of victim's mentality, talk about embalancing
0:31.8	it, not a brutality, use it as a crutches to wipe, everyone casually does not black,
0:35.9	I was acting the vice and why they mad at me, I'm not exactly what they thought of me,
0:39.6	Ellie and Nathan put some defeat, but really I'm undefeated, I never got them, I genius
0:43.4	I'm doubting who I can be, and I'm a rality, I need the former team with, and you just
0:47.8	sew it all together like a seamstress, we talkin' business, ecstasy, so I be talkin'
0:51.1	my greediness, cat my line of Pope, the coming feeders, you don't come near the hood,
0:55.1	we pray to a black jeep, and no black visas from a family like visas to see us from overseas,
1:00.1	can't get past seasons, we escape from the traps and trap visas, walkin' that fine line,
1:04.5	big tonic shed trees, as we just, we international, not for the national, we international,
1:14.2	not for the national, we international, not for the national, we international,
1:23.6	not for the national, I'm a blessed man, I never felt less than, never heard nothing,
1:27.4	I just learned from deaf jam, blessed from classrooms, I learned from ex-plan, like bourgeois sang,
1:31.9	I knew the east is the best land, no life in the west, my mom and pop, they retired,
1:35.7	no left fam, came with crutch-jam, but who need a stress, when you can rest on red sands,
1:39.9	life less threatening, and less than depressing every day here at exam,
1:43.8	plus the office politics, the worst, for the fortune, if you not laid off from work,
1:48.2	janitor was slaying, we're paid off to dirt, and it's an E, not an A,
1:51.4	when we prayed on the church, prosperity, gospel, preacher cleaned up,
	...

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