Hurricane (Live)

This song is called hurricane

If you got any political pull at all

Then you help us get this man out of jail

Back onto the streets

Pistol shots ring out on a barroom night

Enter Patty Valentine from the outer hall

She sees a bartender and a pool of blood

Cries out, "My God, they've killed 'em all"

Here comes the story of the hurricane

The man the authorities came to blame

For somethin' that he never done

Put in a prison cell but one time

He coulda been the champion of the world

Three bodies lyin' there does Patty see

And another man named Bello movin' mysteriously

"I didn't do it," he says and he throws up his hands

I was only robbin' the register, I hope you understand

I saw him leave

And he says and he stops

"One of us had better call up the cops"

And so Patty calls the cops

And they arrive on the scene

With their red lights flashin' in the hot New Jersey night

Meanwhile far away in another part of town

Rubin Carter and a couple of friends are drivin' around

Number one contender for the middleweight crown

Had no idea what kinda shit was about to go down

When a cop pulled him over to the side of the road

Just like the time before and the time before that

In Paterson that's the way things go

If you're black you might as well not show up on the streets

'Less you wanna draw the heat

Alfred Bello laid this ramp on the cops

Me and Arther Dexter Bradley were in here prowlin' around

We saw two men runnin' out, they looked like middleweights

Jumped into a white car with out of state plates

And Miss Patty Valentine just nodded her head

Cop said, "Wait a minute boys, this ones not dead"

They took him to the infirmary

And though this man could hardly see

They told him he could identify the guilty man

Four in the mornin' when they hauled Rubin in

Took him to the hospital and they brought him upstairs

The wounded man looks up through his one dyin' eye

Said, "Why'd you bring him in here for?

He ain't the guy"

Yes, here's the story of the hurricane

The man the authorities came to blame

For somethin' that he never done

Put in a prison cell but one time

He coulda been the champion of the world

Four months later, the ghettos are in flame

Rubin's in South America fighting for his name

While Arther Dexter Bradley's still in the robbery game

And the cops are puttin' the screws to him lookin' for someone to blame

Remember that murder that happened in a bar

Remember, you said you saw the getaway car

Think you'd like to play ball with the law?

Think it mighta been that fighter that you saw runnin' that night

Don't forget, now, your ways

Arther Dexter Bradley said, "I'm really not sure"

Cops said, "A poor boy like you could use a break

We got you for that motel job we were talkin' to your friend, Bello

You don't wanna have to go back to jail

Be a nice fellow

You'll be doin' society a favor

That son of a bitch is brave and gettin' braver

We wanna put his ass in stir

We wanna pin this triple murder on him

He ain't no gentleman, Jim"

Rubin can take a man out with just one punch

But he never did like to talk about it all that much

"It's my work," he'd say

"And I do it for the pay

When it's over I just as soon go on my way

Up to some paradise

Where the trout streams flow and the air is nice

And I ride a horse along the trail"

But then they took him to the jail house

Where they try to turn a man into a mouse

All of Rubin's cards were marked in advance

The trial was a pig circus, he never had a chance

The judge made Rubin's witnesses drunkards from the slums

To the white folks who watched, he was revolutionary bum

And to the black folks he was just a crazy ****

No one doubted that he pulled the trigger

Though they could not produce the gun

The DA said he was the one who did the deed

And the all white jury agreed

Rubin Carter was a-falsely tried

Crime was murder one and guess who testified?

Arther Dexter Bradley and Bello, well, they both lied

And the newspapers, they all went along for the ride

How can the life of such a man

Be in the palm of some fool's hand?

To see him obviously framed

Couldn't help but make me feel ashamed to live in a land

Where justice is a game

Now all the criminals in their coats and their ties

Are free to drink martinis and watch the sun rise

While Rubin sits like Buddha in a ten foot cell

An innocent man in a living hell

That's the story of the hurricane

But it won't be over till they clear his name

And give him back the time he's done

Put in a prison cell but one time

He coulda been the champion of the world