Send in the rats to guard the cheese protect the necks of sanctioned thieves another death, another coward who’s on the clock but off the record Rough Ride. Slave. alibis, fast as you can dig the graves if the fires have to burn all your festering cities half way to the ground for every one, every dead mother’s son - then I guess it’s all coming down because nothing’s left to dignify this excessive farce for another business quarter or election year born on the downside of an invisible cage. death in custody. broken neck of a world in chains. like it’s an incident and not a system of the deputized and their excusers you are collateral it was acceptable no lives matter now cut you down. --- This song was written in Spring of 2015 in the wake of the murder of Freddie Gray at the hands of Baltimore Police (all 6 of whom were ultimately exonerated). As the epidemic worsened, we released this song early after the 2016 police slayings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castille , with the following statement: "We had reservations about posting this, not wanting it to come off as insensitive, opportune or self-serving (“Fuck this tragedy and here's a song dealing with it, Preorder Here!”) but at the same time, really wanting to post it, and right now. This is how we honestly feel, and the epitome of what this music still represents for us. It’s how we share grief and anger over such horrors, how we vent and process them personally and contribute to the greater dialogue about it publicly; we form our words and songs into a scream and let it out to join the others. So: We're putting this song up early in light of the rising death toll in one of the worst mass murders in modern western history, to help sustain the conversation and if nothing else to offer support, condolences and solidarity from our corner of the world. We stand with all victims of systematic violence, abuse and deliberate oppression. “Abuse of Power Comes As No Surprise” - Jenny Holzer"

Warlords, securing monopolies on the balance of terror // mutually assured disease it's not the Cold War that never ended it's the Crusades we're still abiding talk about Rogue States with a stockpile to rival the big bang and Nuclear Ambitions, because our own go without saying worry about it, because you know what's in your own black heart what power does and always will who's the one that's dropped one on the living again? Atomic Christ // you’ve got them kneeling can't control it // I'm done subscribing to this.

Sprawling like weeds to its final breath the scourge of empire in the throes of death we brought the seeds of our oldest disease chained up below deck new markets, new beginnings new hunting grounds for the rich trample what you have to // shackle who you must take it all, every creature great & small every body and culture // all yours to plunder christendom down your throat new world swinging from a rope the west is a tired lie waiting to take itself out.

Twilight of the harbinger // apex predator never stopping to question until the death bed why all his gods look like him & how strange to be conclusion & protagonist of the sacred myths the creature that creation was created for reassured by anthropocentric manmade justifications because all is commodity if all is dominion // grow pinnacle of history's labours and not the first weak link in the chain first animal with nothing to offer out to take all & sink the whole ark absolving himself all the way to the grave it's all for you // was all for you

History maligned // reality reassigned dogma for homework // interference with a healthy mind head in the sand // ass in the air teach me perversion groomed from the start // doomed to their part suffer the children this education is a broken record a broken fairy tale with one set of answers to swallow // memorize and spit back up for the rest of their lives closed minds deified // status quo enshrined revisionist curriculum interference with a healthy mind (what fucking creator?) the only creation I can see is a system that preys on its young and weak the only release - bitter end of a hollow church and state two thousand years and two testaments late

Predisposed to a lack of control I did it young & I did it well got hooked at a susceptible age on all the things that i could live without bottles to gods // tv to cops // and it stuck I'm no one's saint, I just ran out of patience for the fuckers that would suck out my days in dollars and leave me to wake up in shadows I know my reasons, with or without the anthems these aren't the guns that mean shit to stick to it's whats left of you when all this goes when the train pulls out only enemy is in a mirror a bad year // a few wrong turns and any of us could be the other I try to remember 'cause the train was long gone when I dug myself out

Truth is not in your constitution turn your back on the human condition you can't waterboard a social relationship you can't disappear this many witnesses you're running out of level heads to put prices on they're running out of whistles to blow when it spills into daylight // and burns through the night remember your alibi of 'progress and freedom' as you shoot the messenger dead so why stop now? I've been negotiating with terrorists since the day I was born & when I cower in silence those animals win the heroes you celebrate // all dissidents in their time but show me the man and I'll show you the crime

Scapegoat // run for your life these liberators wish you nothing but genocide homelands // blown apart sacrificed as pawns in a pissing match of lesser gods run for cover // from the perfect storm choose the mob or the fucking gun worldwide front lines // refuge? white lies all sides radicalized

Misery assembly line // desperation by design you teach me helplessness // sell me dependence give me the keys to a worthless kingdom where everyone's smiling // laughing and dying clawing for the poisons you send down the line front row seats to their own enslavement on a long march to funerals they can't afford ground up for feed // to money and machines dying on a waiting list for a hope that never comes sinking in the mud // in a total void

I saved the messages you don't remember to play you back when you got better you missed the exit and went on sinking the cancer growing // the man is shrinking and all of that time spent laughing at life you let down your guard and it all starts slipping away yeah some shit went missing // and you went missing with it so far gone you couldn't see when you'd stopped pulling it off // it was painful to watch and now it's just this old wound I like to rub some salt in now and again a played out cautionary tale a worn out eulogy for a friend never coming back // never coming down it must be a good good feeling to carry you so far away it must be some heaven I could never understand I saved the messages you don’t remember to play you back when you got better you missed the exit // went right on sinking the cancer growing the man succumbs