What is “Block Party Forever” about?
"Block Party Forever" is a warm, detailed memory of a summer block party: Mr. Earl on the grill, Auntie in a lawn chair, a girl riding her first two-wheeler while the whole street stops to watch. Kairo West recalls never feeling richer and leans on Maya Angelou's words about how people make you feel to explain why the memory lasts, before joking that he wants to be buried under a speaker. Arriving sixth on Baldwin Bus Receipt, it turns the album from anthems toward close-up storytelling.
Block Party Forever lyrics
Summer on the block
Speakers in the window
Everybody outside
Listen
Mr. Earl got the grill going, smoke up in the maple
Kids doing cartwheels on a mattress by the table
Auntie in the lawn chair, remote control in her hand
DJ cousin Twin plugged into granddaddy's amp stand
Somebody's daughter got her first two-wheel today
Whole block stopped to watch her ride and forget the way
Old heads at the corner telling lies about their glory
Every story twice as long and half as true as the story
The ice cream truck rolled in and changed the whole economy
Every kid on the block holding a dollar like a monopoly
I ain't never felt as rich as I felt that Sunday
When the block was the whole world and tomorrow was an anyway
Block party forever, block party forever
Put the speakers in the window, put the chairs together
Block party forever, block party forever
Every good day I ever had was a Saturday forever
(Forever, forever, forever)
Miss Linda brought her pound cake, nobody ate the icing
Uncle Ray was the bouncer at his own back fence inviting
All the neighborhood dads taking turns on the spades table
Talk a little trash, cut a little slab, come up, we able
The kids had a choreography they invented in an hour
To a song on the radio, a whole new superpower
Somebody's speakers started fading, somebody else brought a pair
Nobody had to ask, the block was a democracy of care
Maya said people will forget what you said and what you did
But they'll never forget how you made them feel, and I still feel this
Block party is a memory, block party is a method
Block party is the reason I still look for the connection
Block party forever, block party forever
Put the speakers in the window, put the chairs together
Block party forever, block party forever
Every good day I ever had was a Saturday forever
When I die
Put me in a box made of block parties
Bury me under a speaker
Let the bass do the rest
Block party forever
Block party forever
Block party
Forever