Women's History Month: Northern State

Hesta Prynn, Spero, and DJ Sprout form the hip-hop trio known as Northern State, the female's answer to the Beastie Boys. The Beastie Boys are the reigning force for a certain type of hip-hop that revolves around a dope series of pop culture allusions spit over a phat beat and conjuring up a vague sense of political awareness, if not activism. The only reason the Beastie Boys reign still is that not more people know about Northern State. They bring not only the pop culture allusion, but a slew of literary allusions, lines randomly stolen out of folk songs, and a sharp enough political focus to articulate their enemies with style.

2008 Supplement -- Best Female Songs Ever, Vol. 1

1. Jill Sobule - "Jetpack"(from Underdog Victorious, 2004)

This tender, heart-wrenching acoustic ballad is proof positive, for those that ever doubted it, that both the lower classes and lesbians have emotionally complex relationships. Its brillaince is that Sobule doesn't take the easy route many songwriters do of telling the audience these things. She shows us she is poor -- "but I don't have a jetpack, I don't even have a car. All I have is this token and a head full of stars" she cries in anguish. As for being a lesbian, you mostly have to pick that out of the other tracks on Underdog Victorious, an album that begins with a failing relationship, goes into some social work as a way of healing, reflects on the relationship, and ends with a potential fling with a butch cop. Of course, one could look at the speaker's obsession with baseball and dominant role in the relationship as defying gender normatives.

2. Mary Lou Lord - "Shake Shugaree" (from Got No Shadow, 1998)

Despite being a talented songwriter in her own write [sic], Lord provides what may be her best performance on this traditional folk song collected by Elizabeth Cotten. The double-tracked vocal, providing an imperfect, folksy harmony lends the song the proper sense of both awe and sorrow as the speaker sells away any hope at livelihood.

3. Mary Fahl - "Going Home" (from Gods and Generals soundtrack, 2003)

Originally a member of a Boston group known as the October Project, Mary Fahl made her solo debut on the soundtrack for the Civil War film Gods and Generals, and it was a glorious debut. The soundtrack featured numerous symphonic compositions and two with vocals -- this composition of Fahl's and Bob Dylan's "Cross the Green Mountain." Reissued on Tell Tale Signs, "Cross the Green Mountain" is now getting the credit it deserves as one of the finest songs in Dylan's canon. As great as it is, though, it may not be the best song recorded for Gods and Generals. Lyrically, Dylan may win out but Fahl's rich and textured voice lends this period piece a pathos deep enough to be plowed through.

4. Suzanne Vega - "Ironbound/Fancy Poultry" (from Solitude Standing, 1987)

In this song, Suzanne Vega dreamily imagines an open market in Portugal where women are bound in iron, then butchered and sold in parts -- "breasts and thighs and hearts." The metaphor to women being pieces of meat is obvious and a bit cliche, but in the song Vega makes it visceral enough that it sounds new and engaging.

5. Peggy Seeger - "Gonna Be An Engineer" (1970, reissued on Best of Broadside 1961-1988, 2000)

This song systematically deconstructs so many of the barricades which have attempted to hold women back, and brillaintly so. It looks at how women are forced into being objects, locked into marriage, robbed of fair pay. Every line is a direct protest. And all of it set to a poppy, bouncing beat that creates a tense contradiction, simultaneously undercutting and sharpening the song's edge. Like Roberta in Edith Nesbit's The Railway Children, Peggy Seeger is not content to sit idly by and let men take all the fun jobs.

6. Kimya Dawson - "Loose Lips" (2006, reissued on Juno soundtrack 2008)

Really, this song is more or less a nonsensical string of allusions. We start off with World War I propaganda about spreading was strategy to the enemy. We get some lines which do get a bit more serious, though -- calling for Bush to be ousted and arguing the ills of suicide. The real treat though comes from Dawson's rhyming skills. She has more verbosity than Paul Barman with lines like "They think we're disposable? Well, both my thumbs're opposable. Spell that on a double word and triple letter score."

7. Joan Baez - "All My Trials" (from Joan Baez, 1960)

This spiritual about finding hope in the afterlife, hope that God will repay us for our trials, carves deep into the soul. It may not be Joan Baez's best known song, but it is one of her best performances, one that, like the river Jordan, chills the body but warms the soul.

8. Joni Mitchell - "A Case of You" (from Blue, 1971)

Prince's Joni Mitchell rip-off, "Ballad of Dorothy Parker," sounds like it could have come off of Court and Spark, but when he decided to record a cover of one of her songs, he chose "A Case of You." Blue is filled with brillaint evocations of heartbreak and regret. "A Case of You" is about the difficulty of letting go while knowing that the person you are leaving behind will continue to effect your life ad infinitum. Mitchell sings that her man is in her "blood like holy wine." She has internalized him, and what's more she's built him up to be like Jesus, an implicit comparison in that he has transubstantiated within her. Mitchell misreads a metaphor, visits a fortune teller and is drawn to devlish men; an impressive feat to cram in to less than four and a half minutes.

9. Billie Holiday - "Strange Fruit" (1939, numerous reissues)

This is often cited as the ultimate protest song. Writted by Abel Meeropol, adopted son of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg -- the American communists who sold the bomb to the Russians --, this song describes the fruits of racism -- black, rotting bodies, bloated and swollen, swinging from poplar branches. Seventy years on, it is still urgent and necessary, as evinced by such songs working against it as "Barack, the Magic Negro." How sad America sometimes is. We must hope it can heal from these wounds.

10. Scarlett Johansson - "Fannin St." (from Anywhere I Lay My Head, 2oo8)

I think this song is about avoiding priggish conformity on one level, and also about the dangers of going one place only for the purpose of escaping another. Anyway, when we escape, we often don't know what we are leaving behind. What I do know is, after listening to this song I want to observe Fannin St., but only from a protected spot far, far away, safe from whatever allure might try to trap me there.

11. Nellie McKay - "It's A Pose" (from Get Away From Me, 2004)

Nellie is an idol of mine. While I think this song essentializes men a little too much at times, and I'm not entirely comfortable with it, I realize that McKay is trying to make me uncomfortable and I like it. In a 1993 issue of Esquire magazine, there is an article that defines what they term the post-sensitive male, a term which resonated with me at the time, though I recognized myself as not a part of it, and which I have seen more and more as I've grown older and wiser. This seems to be the kind of constructed masculinity -- faux intellectual and faux feminist -- that McKay so incisively deconstructs in "It's A Pose," which may constitute her most striking set of lyrics to date.

12. Tom Tom Club - "Genius of Love" (from Tom Tom Club, 1981)

The Tom Tom Club is more or less Talking Heads minus David Byrne, a fruitful side project while the rest of the group waited for their mastermind to prep his next cerebral soundscape. This song may be better than anything Talking Heads released, though. Musically, this is an extension of the naked funk sound Prince was experimenting with back in 1980. Lyrically, its a whole nother beast. The speaker is a woman recently released from prison and trying to find herself a funkified man. She wants "natural fun" with a rhythmically-blessed black man. Among those she expresses interest in: George Clinton, Bootsy Collins, Bob Marley, Smokey Robinson, Sly and Robbie, and Kurtis Blow. The lady was surely up to date. Near the end, the genius himself shows up on the scene, breaking down some old school hippity-hoppity and laying down his love for James Brown. True genius.

13. Natalie Imbruglia - "Wishing I Was There" (from Left of the Middle, 1997)

This song is a brilliant example of how phrasing can help a song out. The beat is cool, the melody is great, the chorus is catchy, but what really makes this song stand out is the start-stop rhythm of the vocals when Imbruglia lingers over phrases like "well, fine.... till I think of the problem."

14. Maria Muldaur - "Midnight At the Oasis" (from Maria Muldaur, 1973)

This song is basically just a pean to sultry sex in the Sahara. At times, it can be a bit stereotypically offensive in how it presents arabs, but it is never jingoistic. It stereotypes, but is respectful of the culture. What makes it memorable, though, is Muldaur's shimmering, slinky vocal and that near-disco beat that seems fit for a moonlight rendezvous.

15. Northern State -"The Man's Dollar" (from Dying In Stereo, 2002)

One of the great traditions in rapping is boasting, and there is no dearth of boasts in this bad-ass romp through American culture. I mean, who else writes a book report about the Federal Budget? Of course, my favorite might be that "like Derek Jeter, I'm-a make you stop short." But then, there's always "I'm more European than an English muffin." Decisions, decisions....

16. Loretta Lynn - "Mrs. Leroy Brown" (from Van Lear Rose, 2004)

In the tradition of response songs, Loretta Lynn calls out Jim Croce's classic "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown." In the voice of his wife, Lynn sounds pissed to hell that Leroy has left her alone and destitute to watch after the kids. She has been good and faithful; I mean, she's almost drunk from the drink's that [she's] turned down." She doesn't deserve a prick like Leroy Brown. What is she gonna do about it? Take his money from the bank, buy a new car, beat the fuck out of the woman Leroy's sleeping with and skip town from the sound of it.

17. Lorrie and Larry Collins - "Mercy" (1958, reissued on Loud, Fast and Out of Control, 1999)

Guitar-slinger Larry Collins was only fourteen when he lay down the searing axe work on this song. His sister Lorrie was sixteen. Her breathy, raspy voice, calling out that her man makes her cry mercy, sounds like it belongs to a cougar in heat. This song is the exact reason why people thought rock was so dangerous.

18. Hollywood Jills - "He Makes Me So Mad" (1968, reissued on One Kiss Can Lead To Another, 2005)

This song is a great girl group track in the tradition of the Shangri-La's "Leader of the Pack." The lead singer calls out complaints about her boyfriend while the other girls respond. The end result is pretty hilarious. None of the complaints are really valid, and the other girls opinions reflect that.... for the most part. The final complaint is that the girl's boyfriend takes her to see movies at the dollar theatre. Finally her friends turn on the boyfriend and call him out. Its incredibly kitschy, but it is also incredible fun set against a steady rhythm guitar that is punctuated by some well-placed horn charts.

19. The Runaways -"Cherry Bomb" (from The Runaways, 1976)

Joan Jett has always rocked, and this was the earliest evidence of that rocking. Total punk attitude about a girl who is explosive telling herparents to deal with it and quit dictating morality. Many will remember this song from when it was expertly used in Dazed and Confused.

20. Blondie - "X Offender" (from Blondie, 1976)

This song introduced the world to Deborah Harry. Masquerading as another "Leader of the Pack"esque number, "X Offender." The song is sung to a cop from a dominatrix attempting to seduce him. The spicy tale is propelled by some plowing runs on the Farfisi organ and what sounds like a guitar solo based around the F7 chord -- not the easiest shape to make.

21. The Revillos - "Motorbike Beat" (1980, reissued on Children of Nuggets, 2005)

Arguably, the women here may be on background vocals, but they do sing the chorus and they make the verses. In this breakneck ode to motorcycle mayhem is made by the women singing about how they love men on motorcycles. It's surf guitar and revved up engines gived it the amphetamine-fueled feel it needs to flow from the speakers like molten lava.

22. Samantha Ronson - "Pull My Hair Out" (2004)

One listen to "Pull My Hair Out" and it becomes clear that djing and being Lilo's girlfriend is the wrong career path for Samantha Ronson. The punk guitars with a metal grind and cheerleader-style chants coupled with a dance floor bass beat make this a syrupy, irresistible pop confection that is still edgy enough that most listeners might be afraid to sink their teeth into it. Even though this single got no attention upon its release, Roc-a-fella made a big mistake in shelving Red, the full-length rock album this was drawn from. After paying for Ronson to record it, they mysteriously sat on it after the failure of the first single, instead releasing only a few of the lighter weight tracks on ventures like the soundtrack to Mean Girls. This is the only song released from the sessions with real bite, and its ready to draw blood.

Sir Edmund Hillary

I think that with all the hubbub surrounding the recent death of Sir Edmund Hillary, it is important to look back and reflect on his greatest achievement: inspiring one of the phattest boasts in hip-hop history. As Hesta Prynn spouts it: "Sir Edmund Hillary couldn't climb this. Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme this." Not only is this a fun rhyme, but its effective on multiple levels. What Edmund Hillary can't top is badass feminist rapping. With him being an icon of the rugged white male, who still had to hire a heretofore unnamed native guide so he can get credit for something many non-Westerners had almost assuredly already done, that makes this like a pretty good slap in the face of pompous maleified culture. You go girls!

100 Albums, 100 Words (60-51)

60. Northern State – Dying In Stereo (2003)

This album works because Hesta Prynn, Guinea Love (Spero), and DJ Sprout are master signifiers, verbally cutting down men with verbal acumen. Case in point: “like Derek Jeter, I’m-a make you stop short.” Here Hesta Prynn is signifying on other MCs who think they’re dope; most MCs are male, thus she is spittin’ it at men. Derek Jeter, short stop of the New York Yankees, is a symbol of masculinity. Here she flips the position he plays into “stop short,” simultaneously disrupting Jeter’s masculine power and harvesting it for her own use in signifiying on other (mostly male) MCs. Boo-yah!

59. Saturday Night Fever (1977)

This album could be titled Bee Gees Greatest Hits, Plus. As great as the Bee Gees songs are, both the infinitely popular “Stayin’ Alive” and the actually good “You Should Be Dancing,” the real gems are in that plus half of the equation. Both classically-inspired instrumentals are good, but “Fifth of Beethoven” stands as one of the best instrumentals ever. “Open Sesame” is perhaps the best track Kool & the Gang ever recorded; who can resist the “genie of sound”? Sure, maybe they didn’t need to include two versions of “More Than A Woman,” but this “Disco Inferno” still burns.

58. Black Sabbath – Paranoid (1970)

Ozzy’s crowning achievement, Paranoid is both wicked and good. Case in point: “War Pigs/Luke’s Wall.” “Luke’s Wall” is the definition of instrumental wickedness as Tony Iommi’s guitar swirls around and around. “War Pigs,” the other half of the song, is a righteous denunciation of war for profit. Denouncing the capitalist pigs of the Military Industrial Complex, it is heavy metal’s “Masters of War.” In addition to “War Pigs,” “Iron Man” and “Paranoid” feature the catchiest riffs. “Faeries Wear Boots” is one of the quirkiest titles for one of the coolest songs. Paranoid deserves its spot as a heavy metal landmark.

57. Nirvana – Nevermind (1991)

In middle school, everyone wore flannel. Granted, at my school that was as much indebted to the rise of West Coast gangstas as to grunge, but, really, are they that different? Both attempt to authenticate the voice of a disgruntled youth culture. Regardless, I wanted blue-and-black plaid to rock with my canvas K-Swiss. What my mom bought me was a lavender-and-green plaid Ralph Lauren. You can’t get street cred in that, and it’s a bit too bourgeois for Cobain. Now, more working class than thug, I still want the black and blue, if only to fulfill my manufactured proletarian fantasy.

56. Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin II (1969)

The “Stairway to Heaven” is like the stairway up the tower of Babel – it leads to inflated pride for seventies’ rock enthusiasts, but the guitar playing is so intricate and beautiful on “Ramble On” that it makes one forgive the references to Lord of the Rings. “Ramble,” along with “Thank You” and “What Is and What Never Should Be,” make this one of the most lushly gorgeous albums ever. “Whole Lotta Love” and “Heartbreaker” hang on some great riffs and are as experimentally melodic as metal can get. Meanwhile, “Living Loving Maid” cleans house in the straight out rocking category.

55. Guns’N’Roses – Appetite For Destruction (1987)

James Brown writes a song about traveling from city to city on tour; Ernest & Julio Gallo name a bum wine after it, on which Axl Rose gets shitfaced and writes the hardest-rocking tribute to alcoholism ever. The Gallo brothers had the gall to demand payment from G’n’R, but I can almost guarantee they never paid James Brown. Along with the obvious hits, “Mr. Brownstone,” “Out Ta Get Me,” “Think About You,” (featuring Izzy Stradlin’s underrated songwriting) and “Rocket Queen” help to ensure this album’s lasting appeal. You can almost hear the grit of hard living on the Sunset Strip.

54. Bob Dylan – John Wesley Harding (1967)

This album must have sounded like a wet noodle lashing against the monstrous wall of psychedelia when it was released, but its quiet, understated strength made it determined to stand, and it killed psychedelia in one decisive blow. From its rustic matte cover to its simple acoustic strums, John Wesley Harding exudes rootsiness, and is the granddaddy of alternative country. But there’s more going on here, too. The album’s cryptic vignettes, littered as they are with outlaws, retell Biblical tales within the context of the Old West. Dylan records his first piano-based masterpiece here too with the majestic “Dear Landlord.”

53. Outkast – Stankonia (2000)

Stankonia, on the strength of “Ms. Jackson,” is almost the great sensitive male hip-hop album that it probably would have been had Andre 3000 gone it alone, but, even with the inclusion of “Gangsta Shit,” this album comes close to the mark. Big Boi’s contributions are certainly no detriment either, especially on the delightful “We Luv Deez Hoez.” “Gasoline Dreams” remains a bluntly scathing commentary on the glut of white (read: corporate) america (sorry, Marshall, but your song can’t compare). The album does leave one mystery unsolved though: just what are they saying at the end of “Bombs Over Baghdad?”

52. Elvis Costello – Imperial Bedroom (1982)

Following Nellie McKay’s Get Away From Me, this is the second Geoff Emerick production on this list, and perhaps the more Sgt. Pepperesque of the two. Sonically, it resembles the Beatles’ golden period with tinges of Tin Pan Alley. Thematically, the album deals with just what the title suggests, imperialism in the bedroom. This takes shape in a number of forms from incest to molestation to good old-fashioned domestic abuse. Costello masterfully explores the social implications and consequences of these grim practices with an emotional sensitivity that is bared out by a keen focus on the details of paralyzed hearts.

51. Nellie McKay – Pretty Little Head (2006)

It is hard to follow up perfection with brilliance, but that is exactly what Nellie McKay did with Pretty Little Head. Mostly, the album is very good, particularly on tracks like “Columbia Is Bleeding” and “The Big One.” “Pounce” is a personal favorite, especially with its guilty pleasure “meow” chorus. The album buoys itself with many short songs; had it cut off the screamed outro and, possibly, the intro of “Mama and Me” then it would be much more accessible. Likewise, the slurred vocal of “Pink Chandelier” kept it from reaching its full potential. Of course, perfection rarely strikes twice.

Can I Keep This Pen?

Fem-hop trio Northern State's third album posits the question Can I Keep This Pen? The answer, I suppose, is that you can, but you may want to consider throwing it away or at least putting it far, far away in a drawer for the next several years.

That's harsh, I know, but I had been anxiously awaiting this album since before I knew Adam Horowitz was doing some work on production, and that just took my expectations to a new level. I adore Dying In Stereo. All City feels like it makes some concessions to market expectations for the sake of Sony (especially on "Summer Never Ends"), but that shouldn't have been a problem with Can I Keep This Pen? since Columbia dropped Northern State several months ago.

Unfortunately, weak writing and a move away from mad beats towards odd mixes of organs and acoustics meant that this wasn't near the album it could-a, should-a, would-a been. Would it be like this if it was up to you? It wouldn't were it up to me, but it's up to Spero, Sprout and Prynn.

One thing that defines rap is an MC's ability to clown. Previously, Northern State rocked this. For instance, they once claimed "Edmund Hillary couldn't climb this." Telling the man who climed Mt. Everest that he's not as good as you're rap is pretty tight. Now Northern State is relying on "your mom" jokes, which isn't necessarily bad in and of itself, but its bad when all you've got is "I heard your mom drives an ice cream truck." First of all, its hearsay. Second of all, ice cream trucks rule. I love me some ice cream and I love the song the truck plays (which would have made a nice sample around then). I'm supposing this crack is rooted in the fact that ice cream truck drivers probably don't make much, but classism has never sat well with me.

Another problem is the rhyming itself. Northern State has tried to expand their rhyming ability and try to push in some new directions, but its just not working. I'm not saying you can't rhyme "chagrin" with "ottoman," but if all you have to get across with the rhyme is that "MTV much to my chagrin is about as exciting as an ottoman" then its not convincing, especially when you also try to get "diamonds" and "long island" to rhyme as well. I mean, I understand that MTV being as boring as an old-person word for sofa is frustrating, but this sounds about as exciting as Woodrow Wilson trying to start shit with the Ottoman Empire, which is to say less exciting than MTV.

Both of the above examples are from the album's opening song, "Mic Tester," but the album doesn't get better from there. Elsewhere they crack on someone by saying they are "gonna be spinning like [a] rotiseree." I understand the girls are all vegetarians, but I'm sure you can cook an eggplant on a rotiseree and it would taste damn good. That's a compliment, not an insult. Elsewhere, the girls are listing lists of things they hate in rhymes, and come up with this gem (parentheses mine): "Violent Pornography (keep it goin' girl), Police Brutality (that's right), Ethnicity (uhh.... you lost me.)" How does Ethnicity fit? How can they hate it? Even if they want to try playing the colorblind card, they know race and ethnicity are different things; I still remember them celebrating their Italian pride.

One thing that made the first album so pleasurable was that it intelligently snuck in politics among amazing rhymes. On the second album, the songs got a little didactic at times as the focus on politics increased, except for the last track, "Summer Never Ends," where they basically sell out to the Cosmogirl image they were deriding in "Girl For All Seasons." Here they find themselves pushing that further, and becoming materialistic and classist at times.

At one point one of the girls compares herself to Boss Tweed because she's "large and in charge." It would be cool to establish how she was different than Tweed and then claim to be in charge of him. Unfortunately, being like Tweed isn't cool. Tweed was a hardcore party organizer who is responsible for some of the most vicious abuses of labor our country ever experienced. Tweed owned New York back in the days before things like minimum wage and child labor laws.

In "Suckamofo," a song notable for cussing as much as just about any other song I know, the girls attack a "suckamofo" who is looking at them: "It seems you lack employment and I don't exist just for your enjoyment . . . so suckamothafucka get out of my way." I would expect the Northern State I fell in love with to have sympathy for those without jobs, although I don't know why I should expect that out of the new Northern State when I can't even expect logic; the same suckamofo who has no job in the final verse begins the song with a Hummer, which I suppose he must have paid for with welfare money.

When Northern State does try to get political at the end of "Suckamofo" the attempt falls flat: "This is going out to the Democrats. In 2004, y'all came real whack. But now that we got some real candidates, can we please come correct in 2008?" I get what they mean, but there were good candidates in 2004. Howard Dean was doing great for awhile. Also, every year there are several great candidates who simply lack the funds to win the nomination, and 2004 was no exception to that rule. Elsewhere the girls suggest that "while we dropping bombs, why don't you ask your moms." This vague suggestion to try problem of bombings is beyond trying to figure out. What are we supposed to ask them? Do our moms control the bombs?

Despite all these weaknesses, to be fair they are several glimmers of hope.

Some individual lines do remind me of the power of early-Northern State's metaphors, such as "I use the microphone like a judge with a gavel." The idea of using the mic to pass judgement and spread morality is great. In "Mother May I," which unfortunately features a curiously annoying chorus, Hesta lays down one of her best lines on the album: "I like my coffee with lots of gin." I drink coffee with lots of stuff, but drinking it with gin is pretty unique. It is these kind of original details which humanize Northern State and make them endearing.

The song "Iluvitwhenya" reclaims Biggie's "Big Papa" through repetition of the title phrase, feminizing it and making it safe for women. The lack of spacing is postmodern and reminiscent of the opening of Toni Morrison's Bluest Eye. The song ends with one of the girls' boyfriends listening to a playback of one of their songs and saying "baby, play it one more time." This steals any thunder Britney Spears might have left and places it in a feminist context.

The album's peak comes with the penultimate song, "Three Amigas." This western adventure follows in the tradition of the Beastie Boys' "Paul Revere." It opens with a twang-talkin' narrator setting the scene, much like in the Dr. Dre-Eminem "Paul Revere"-inflected joint "Bad Meets Evil" (if you haven't heard it, its on the Wild Wild West soundtrack and may be the best thing they recorded together). The concept alone is enough to sell me on it, but it also features some skillful rhyming. Hold-'em-playin' Hesta claims that "at the poker table y'all could call me Miss Deal," as fine a pun as one could hope for.

Another thing about Northern State that has always thrilled me is how they interpolate obscure Bob Dylan lyrics into their songs. On the first album, "The Man's Dollar" snatched up "I'll drink when I'm dry," featured in both "Moonshiner" and "Standing In the Doorway." In Ignite off of All City, the girls pick up on a rare recitation of the poem "Last Thoughts On Woody Guthrie" with "your pillows of feathers turn to blankets of lead." On this album, I thought I'd found a Dylan reference, but I was wrong. Still, I found something almost as good: a Marty Robbins reference. Marty Robbins is one of the original country singers, best known for his ballad "El Paso." The girls not only take the location of Rosa's Cantina from there, but they also steal several lines. While running from the man whose woman he lured away, Robbins steals a horse, singing "I picked a good one; it looked like it could run. Up on his back and away I did ride." The girls refigure this as "I picked a good one; it looked like a good one. I hopped on his back and away I did ride." "Could run" transforming into the repetitive "good one" is a problem, but "hopped" is a much better word than "up." The "h" recalls the horse that was stolen while the "p" links it to the verb "picked," the word that substitutes for stealing.

Hopefully these glimmers that Northern State still has the magic can transform into a great album that shows they can still write as well as any mc in the game.