Gangsta Video (MV)

We grew up in the Hell of the 'Hood',
If you lived on the streets, then you understood
That some of us might make it but others never would
Didn't matter if you could take it, it was bad versus good.

Johnny came to live with us when he turned 10
His mother died a pauper and his dad was in the Pen,
A hardened case of murder who was on Death Row,
So Johnny was an orphan with no where else to go.

We were just like brothers, Johnny and me
I was 8 and he was 10 and he looked after me.
We grew up on the streets and stole whatever we could take.
Just two lost boys who never got a goddam break.

Johnny, Johnny, where you gone wrong?
You grew up too fast and you grew too strong.
I'm the only one who ever knew
The pain that was inside of you.

Johnny dropped out of school when he was seventeen
Graduating Cum Laude to the "gangsta" scene
He rose quickly through the ranks of a criminal gang
And rose from petty thievery to robbin' banks.

While I had made a promise to my mother 'fore she died
That I would try to stay in school and live a better life.
I graduated high school then I quit the gang.
But we argued and I never did saw Johnny again.

I took a different path and I became a cop
While Johnny went to Sing Sing on a murder rap
I heard that he escaped and that he killed a guard
And so the manhunt started and we came down hard.

Johnny, Johnny, where you gone wrong?
You grew up too fast and you grew too strong.
I'm the only one who ever knew
That it was not your fault the things they made you do.

We arrested almost every one of Johnny's lot
Some went quietly and some were badly shot
Then we got a tip about a warehouse crime
And I knew that me and Johnny would meet one last time.

We surrounded the warehouse but we never knew
That the tip we got was planted; it just wasn't true.
We crept inside the building but it was pitch black
And our flashlights couldn't even light the front or the back.

Then we saw the headlights of an oncoming car
That plowed into our team and threw some back very far
In the dark we saw bright flashes and we heard the deadly sound
I took two bullets in my shoulder and collapsed onto the ground.

I heard the hammer of a gun and felt the steel next to my ear
I knew that I had breathed my last and whispered words of prayer.
And then, without a warning I was dragged along the floor
And propped up out of harm's way next to the exit door.

Clouds of smoke from gunpowder filled up the misty air
And through my burning eyes I could hardly see where
Our back-up force had crashed the doors and lit up all the walls
Their automatics blazing as they fired through the halls.

That's when I saw a shadow standing over me
And then I heard him say, we're even, friend, now don't you see -
Your family took me in when I had nowhere else to go
And you're the only brother that I'll ever know.

The bullets were still flying out of everywhere
Getting closer all the time and getting thicker in the air.
It must have been his instinct that had made him see......
He threw his body forward, down on top of me.

Six bullets lodged inside him and his arms went limp.
Then I heard him try to say the words "Goodbye, Jim".
And I knew that it was over and in the quiet of the fray
I whispered "Goodbye Johnny", I'll see you again one day.

They pinned a medal on my chest, promoting me that day
For what happened in that warehouse, I heard the mayor say.
But no one mourned for Johnny when they laid him underground
So no one understood when, to their lasting shock, they found

Among the dirt and shadows that in the wind did wave
A bright and shiny captain's badge on top of Johnny's grave.
And on his headstone were these words, written in by hand,
Just scribbled like a schoolboy they read "Goodbye Friend".

Johnny, Johnny, where you gone wrong?
You grew up too fast and you grew too strong.
I'm the only one who ever knew
The good that was inside of you.