Ink Don't Bleed

Some got hits about the racks that they earn
Say there's Benjamins and Jacksons in their pocket to burn
But when they shoot the video producers pass around a bucket full of rented jewelry for them to rock and return
I know a straightedge rapper who acts like a sheep herder
A vegan on the mic who's screaming that meat's murder
but when everybody's sleepin, he be creepin
slugging back the whiskey, hating himself and sneakin a cheese burger
There's a pop idol at the top of the charts
and while her record's being cut she's on the beach in St. Barts
while a session singer who didn't have the face to make it
signs a nondisclosure agreement and belts out her parts
It's hard, cause I got bars that are big uppin Woody Allen
But maybe he's a predator who's digging in his talons
there's a balance and often i don't know how to feel
In a fake and tainted world, seek the real

Now I can't change the past but a man's gotta man up
It's hard to believe sometimes I get the best of me
Now, I'm doing what I can but I'm a man not a damn chump
I can say it if you need, but I'd rather let the ink bleed

We dismiss our heroes' skeletons no matter how grim
my fans saying "I'd be honored to be injured by him"
well fam, this branch is thin, but i'll go out on a limb
to say she didn't love her ulna poking out of her skin
being pumped full of morphine and tied to machines
they cut off my jeans, I heard her in the ambulance scream
she's in school to do tattoos and might've had nerve damage
So I could've cost a girl a chance at her dream
Meanwhile he pops painkillers, until the dude is numb
knew I was a stupidass just not that I'm a ruthless one
youth is easily influenced so should you be rooting for me
if I touch a thousand lives but on the way I ruin some
the rule of thumb is all publicity's your advantage
but human lives are not collateral damage
bandage the wound and then vanish, blank as the newest of canvases
when they zoom in the cameras give em the truth

I can't change the past but a man's gotta man up
It's hard to believe sometimes I get the best of me
Now, I'm doing what I can but I'm a man not a damn chump
I can say it if you need, but I'd rather let the ink bleed

Megachurch leaders sleeping with male hookers
mayors hitting crackpipes with their cookers
Each week a crooked politician gets caught
we're not shocked when they're cheaters, these days we're shocked when they're not
are they the person you thought? if they're perfect and hot
often we blame the victim, scoffing "they deserved what they got"
actors sweep it under the rug and resume with the plot
but they're amateurs and we can see the boom in the shot
If perception is reality then this could be a shocker
I've done my share of fucked up things that didn't get on Gawker
lots of tiny indiscretions way beyond the public eye
that if you saw would out probably out me as a complicated guy
Mike says you gotta separate a person from their art
but if the art's about that person you can't pull 'em apart
so you better watch the choices that you makin now because
they aren't something that matter, they're the only thing that does

Everything they say conflicts with everything I do
But I must admit I did it so I guess it might be true
Everything they say conflicts with everything I do
But I must admit I did it so I guess it might be true
Everything they say conflicts with everything I do
But I must admit I did it so I guess it might be true
Everything they say conflicts with everything I do
But I must admit I did it so I guess it might be true