Lyrics to
The New Deal

This version of The New Deal was released by Gil Scott-Heron in 1979.

Visit the Gil Scott-Heron Lyrics profile at Decade Lyrics - it has the The New Deal lyrics as well as the rest of the songs by Gil Scott-Heron.

Here's more interesting things in songs and lyrics tied to Gil Scott-Heron or about the 1970s in general.

I have believed in my convictions
And have been convicted for my beliefs
Conned by the constitution
And harassed by the police.
I’ve been billed for the bill of rights
And been treated like I was wrong.
I have become a special amendment
For what included me all along.
Like “All men are created equal.”
(No amendment needed here)
I’ve contributed in every field including cotton
From Sunset Strip to Washington Square.
Back during the non-violent era.
I was the only non-violent one.
As a matter of fact there was no non-violence
’cause too many rednecks had guns.
There seems to have been this pattern
That a lot of folks failed to pick up on.
But all black leaders who dared stand up
Wuz in jail, in the courtroom or gone.
Picked up indiscriminately
By the shocktroops of discrimination
To end up in jails or tied up in trails
While dirty tricks soured the nation.
I’ve been hoodwinked by professional hoods.
My ego has happened to me.
It’ll be alright, just keep things cool!”
“And take the people off the street.
We’ll settle all this at the conference table.
You just leave everything to me.”
Which gets me back to my convictions
And being convicted for my belief
’cause I believe these smiles
in three piece suits
with gracious, liberal demeanor
took our movement off of the streets
and took us to the cleaners
In other words, we let up the pressure
And that was all part of their plan
And every day we allow to slip through our fingers
Is playing right into their hands

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Gil Scott-Heron has released many songs over the years besides The New Deal. Gil Scott-Heron released songs from 1970 to 2005 spanning across albums like Small Talk At 125th And Lenox, Pieces Of A Man, Free Will, Winter In America, The First Minute Of A New Day, It's Your World, From South Africa To South Carolina, Bridges, Secrets, The Mind Of Gil Scott-Heron, 1980, Real Eyes, Reflections, Moving Target, Spirits, and Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson - Messages (Anthology). Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by Gil Scott-Heron.

If you're a fan of lyrics from 1970s songs looking for more songs from 1979 or the 1970s overall, you've come to the right place!

About Lyrics and The New Deal by Gil Scott-Heron

The lyrics for The New Deal are made up of the words, verses and background chorus for the popular 1979 song by Gil Scott-Heron. Like a lot of songs, the lyrics to The New Deal have both direct meanings and metaphorical context hidden within the song's words. All of the meanings are only truly known by the creators of the lyrics for The New Deal - Gil Scott-Heron and any of the writers who worked with them on the song.

If you have an interest in the structure of words and phrases, you can dissect the lyrics to The New Deal by Gil Scott-Heron in multiple ways. The word "lyric" itself derives from the Latin word lyricus, with the actual English word lyrics applied to the definition "words set to music" listed in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms. Continuing the chain, the Latin word lyricus derives from the Greek word λυρικός or lyrikós. This somewhat means "poetry accompanied by the lyre" or "words set to music." You can easily see that by looking at the background of the word lyric, that the "lyrics to The New Deal" means the words set to the music of The New Deal, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by Gil Scott-Heron. The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words to a song. However, the singular form lyric is also commonly used to refer to a specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics. Hence, by this analysis of word structure, you could say that the lyric to The New Deal and the lyrics to The New Deal are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of Gil Scott-Heron who came here looking just for the lyrics to The New Deal, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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