Released: June 9, 2008

Featuring: Joell Ortiz

Songwriter: Joell Ortiz Nas

Producer: DJ Green Lantern

[Intro: Sample]
Forget the terrorist alerts, we need some ghetto alerts
Information we could use, you know:
“Ray-Ray’s on parole, stay off the streets”
Invasion!
The Evil Genius
Green Lantern!

[Chorus]
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“The crackheads stalking, loudmouths is talking”
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“So you know I seen it all before”
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“The crackheads stalking, loudmouths is talking”
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“So you know I seen it all before”

[Verse 1: Nas]
It's cool to love to win but it's better to hate to lose
There's only one Nas, 'bout a hundred thousand yous
You lose money chasing women
Never lose women chasing money
Niggas is broke plus the wolves is hungry
Morgues full of dead niggas who was taking money
Morgues full of niggas who the last shit they ate in they stomach
Spinach and steak, GORE-TEX boot print still on his face
It’s still on his face when we visit his wake
Whatever's undone, I'd do it
Fight against a whole army, one gun I'll use it
Some Sun Tzu shit (Green Lantern)
Creeping on ya like walking pneumonia
You're far from opponents; we could spar for the moments
I stay in deceitful conversations
With creeps with foul natures
Attempted murders trials, the basics
Threatening the witnesses
And relatives of dead victims, it’s the shit we live
(Ghetto!) Queensbridge thug matrimony, clap a phony
Bullets even hit a cracker in his Abercrombie
Psychoanalyst was asking me what happened to me?
See the 'gnac got to me, then the gat got to me
Then, the homies on the block with the stacks of money
Then, these beautiful bitches was bending backwards for me
Then, lames put the rap game in a casket slowly
Man, I don't give a fuck, this is rap to me

[Chorus:]
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“The crackheads stalking, loudmouths is talking”
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“So you know I seen it all before”
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“The crackheads stalking, loudmouths is talking”
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“So you know I seen it all before”

[Interlude: DJ Green Lantern & Joell Ortiz]
Yo, Joell Ortiz, man, go in! (Yaowa!)
Yo, Green, let’s take ‘em on a ride through the ghetto!

[Verse 2: Joell Ortiz]
Planet Earth (Yaowa), the land of the worst, handle ya turf
Cannons’ll burst and break the wrists of amateur jerks (Huh!)
Damn, it’ll hurt to know your man in that hearse
I seen it ten times (For real)
They get a small article, never the headlines (Damn)
Candles in the lobby next to empty ‘gnac bottles
Niggas drunk, talking shit
Like, “When they see this Mac nozzle,” but (What?)
Nothing ever happens
Even if it do, nothing ever happens (Nah!)
We don’t talk and that ain’t gutter if you yapping
In the ghetto (Woo!), you could ask a nigga mother what happened and get a echo
Where I’m from, it’s so bad (Bad)
Bunch of ignorant motherfuckers with no dads
Or he there but he don’t care
'Cause he nursing his dope hab’ (For real)
And when him and they moms argue, he always throw jabs
So they grip a chrome mag
And walk around like “Who want a toe-tag?” (What up?)
Fiending to leave a head see-through like a coat bag
If your life slightly something like the one that Joe had
Then you... (Ghetto!)
Group of Ps, scoop cheese, duck Ds, and squeeze (C’mon)
Breeze in old hoopties bumping new Ortiz (Ah!)
And the hoochies please Gs by getting on they knees
Giving the body part what Scarecrow needs (Haha!)
I’m living my life, the shit that I write is from my heart, my word
So go in your pocket, grab a Sharpie, homie, mark my words
If anybody interfere with me and these bucks
I ain’t only ending careers, dog, I’m beating you up
I’m still ghetto!

[Chorus:]
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“The crackheads stalking, loudmouths is talking”
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“So you know I seen it all before”
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“The crackheads stalking, loudmouths is talking”
(Ghetto!) “The same shit is going on”
“So you know I seen it all before”

Nas

Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones, known to one and all as Nas, is one of hip-hop’s best-known, most mercurial, and lyrically blessed figures ever to touch the microphone. Since his heart-stopping debut turn on Main Source’s “Live at the Barbeque,” Nas has delivered countless beautifully structured, thought-provoking, keenly observed verses.

Growing up in Queens, NY, Nas never really performed in big crowds—he kept to himself. Nas used a different type of vernacular that others didn’t understand, which helped him to stand out from other rappers from his era.

With every ensuing album, Nas always reminds fans that he’s still the same Queensbridge MC who crafted one of the greatest albums of all time, and arguably the bible of Hip-Hop, Illmatic.