Vox Populi
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Audio: Gil Scott-Heron | Home Is Where the Hatred Is
Gilbert Scott-Heron (1949 – 2011) was an American soul and jazz poet, musician, and author known primarily for his work as a spoken-word performer in the 1970s and 1980s. His collaborative efforts with musician Brian Jackson featured a musical fusion of jazz, blues, and soul, as well as lyrical content concerning social and political issues of the time, delivered in both rapping and melismatic vocal styles by Scott-Heron. His music, most notably on the albums Pieces of a Man and Winter in America in the early 1970s, influenced and foreshadowed later African-American music genres such as hip hop and neo soul. Scott-Heron is considered by many to be the first rapper/MC ever. His recording work received much critical acclaim, especially one of his best-known compositions, “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised”. From 2001-2008 Scott-Heron served several prison terms on drug-related charges, and in 2010 released his first new album in 16 years, entitled I‘m New Here. Scott-Heron received a posthumous Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2012.
Home Is Where the Hatred Is
A junkie walking through the twilight
I’m on my way home
I left three days ago, but no one seems to know I’m gone
Home is where the hatred is
Home is filled with pain and it
Might not be such a bad idea if I never never went home again
.
Stand as far away from me as you can and ask me why
Hang on to your rosary beads
Close your eyes to watch me die
You keep saying, kick it, quit it, kick it, quit it
God, but did you ever try
To turn your sick soul inside out
So that the world, so that the world
Can watch you die
.
Home is where I live inside my white powder dreams
Home was once an empty vacuum that’s filled now with my silent screams
Home is where the needle marks
Try to heal my broken heart
And it might not be such a bad idea if I never, if I never went home again
Home again
Home again
Home again
Kick it, quit it
Kick it, quit it
Kick it, quit it
Kick it, can’t go home again
.
Songwriter: Gil Scott-Heron
Vox Populi 
So powerful. So heartbreaking.
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Gil has been one of my favorite artists since his first album Free Will came out in 1972. “Did You Hear What They Said?” has got to be one of the most beautiful songs ever, and unfortunately the loss of young black men is just as real today as when he wrote it about Viet Nam. Now these men are being shot not FOR their country but IN their own country. Heartbreaking.
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Thanks, Lynda! You’re right. We are living in the world that Gil sang about so beautifully.
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So much talent. So much pain
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