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  1. Tracks
  2. Saba
  3. CARE FOR ME
  4. SMILE

TRACK

Saba

SMILE

Release date: 5th April 2018

From CARE FOR ME
Spotify More on Saba

About This Track

'SMILE' pulls back from the weight of its album to find lightness in memory. Saba reminisces about his childhood in his grandmother's Westside Chicago apartment, where red brick, forgotten gardens and splotchy grass stand in for a life lived without much. The song moves between those small, warm moments, tube socks slipping off feet, backyard basketball, family gathered close, and the harder present tense where cousins trap, grandmas worry about strange smells, and keeping the lights on is a real struggle. The track holds both at once. Saba raps about taking life for granted whilst trying to capture it, about making a million dollars so he can move his family somewhere better, about keeping things honest even when everyone else is talking big. His grandmother's lessons sit alongside his cousin's mail-order schemes. The chorus, sung by multiple voices, is simple and insistent: just smile, smile, smile. It's not naive. It's a small act of resistance, a way of holding onto something when the world feels splotchy and incomplete.

"SMILE" is a track by Saba, from the album CARE FOR ME, released 5th April 2018. Full lyrics are available below.

About the Artist

Saba

Saba

Lyrics

SMILE

[Pre-Chorus: Saba]

Sweet Westside Chicago, two-flat apartment

Red brick and garden, that's been forgotten

Grass all splotchy, vacant lot splotchy

Bank account splotchy

And we talk like we from the South

Our parents' parents from the South

And if I make a million dollars (Ah, ah)

I'll vacation in the South, and I'll

[Chorus: Saba, Daoud, daedaePIVOT & Seanzy]

Smile, smile, smile, smile

Smile, smile, smile, smile

Smile, smile, smile, smile

Smile, smile, smile, smile

[Verse: Saba]

Yeah, warm outside and safe out, playground, Grandma payroll cut, yeah

Cut up with my cousins, dream about when we grow up, yeah

Tube socks slipping off our feet, our soles is hella black

When we die we go to Heaven, know my granny taught me that

(Oh, oh-oh-oh) I done lost a friend or two, they moved

Got in trouble for they French, and I ain't mean no "Moulin Rouge"

My backyard that two-on-two, our whole neighborhood unite

I put my fam' in a hotel when they couldn't pay the lights

Life, I be taking for granted, capture the moment, the Canon

My cousin be trappin', it came in the mail

I sat him down, asked his plan, he said, "This shit sell itself"

Grandma said, "What is that smell?"

We turn to Boomhauer like we on "King of the Hill"

Niggas talk that they gon' keep it a hundred, but I rather keep it a mil'

Everybody eat, I treat it like Heath, so that mean it's not a joke

I said I'ma keep it Amel Larrieux—that mean a higher note

My grandma from Pinkhill, and my granddaddy from Houston

And if I make a million dollars, then I'ma tell them we moving

[Chorus: Saba, Daoud, daedaePIVOT & Seanzy]

Smile, smile, smile, smile

Smile, smile, smile, smile

Smile, smile, smile, smile

Smile, smile, smile, smile

[Bridge: Saba; Saba, Daoud, daedaePIVOT & Seanzy]

All that I am is my family, mistakes

Moment of madness I can't seem to evade

More than a canvas, you carry me these days

Practice, I'm trying to remember, remember

All that I am is my family, mistakes

Moment of madness I can't seem to evade

More than a canvas, you carry me these days

Practice, I'm trying to remember, remember

[Pre-Chorus: Saba]

Sweet Westside Chicago, two-flat apartment

Red brick and garden, that's been forgotten

Grass all splotchy, vacant lot splotchy

Bank account splotchy

And we talk like we from the South (Oww)

Our parents' parents from the South

And if I make a million dollars

I'll vacation in the South, and I'll

[Chorus: Saba, Daoud, daedaePIVOT, and Seanzy]

Smile, smile, smile, smile

Smile, smile, smile, smile

Smile, smile, smile, smile

Smile, smile, smile, smile

Track details

From CARE FOR ME

2018
Listen
Album
CARE FOR ME
CARE FOR ME
Saba
Release year
2018
  1. —

More from Saba

Albums & EPs

CARE FOR ME
CARE FOR ME
2018
Mrs. Whoever / Something in the Water
Mrs. Whoever / Something in the Water
From The Private Collection of Saba and No ID
From The Private Collection of Saba and No ID

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Lyrics provided by LRCLIB

View full lyrics page →
BUSY / SIRENS
  • —FIGHTER
  • —PROM / KING
  • —SMILE
  • —BROKEN GIRLS
  • —LOGOUT
  • —CALLIGRAPHY
  • —HEAVEN ALL AROUND ME
  • —GREY
  • Tictactoe
  • Today Years Old
  • Rizoma
  • Non mi piacciono le divise
  • clementine
  • BlimE! – Være med
  • BlimE! – Vuolgge mielde
  • Crash
  • Erewhon
  • a FEW songs
  • Acts 1.5
  • Stop Playing With Me
  • Westside Bound Pt. 4
  • Reciprocity
  • She Called It
  • 30secchop
  • Breakdown
  • BIG PICTURE
  • Stomping
  • Every Painting Has a Price
  • Lunch Break Freestyle
  • BENT
  • Woes of the World
  • Relax
  • Bring Her Home
  • Now and Then
  • How to Impress God
  • Ball Alone
  • Comfort Food (2024)
  • head.rap
  • Don’t Check 4 Me
  • SAND
  • Airplane Mode
  • On The Radar Freestyle (Chicago Edition)
  • Feelin Good
  • Ritha'
  • hue_man nature
  • Back in Office
  • WYD
  • Sab Farzi (From “Farzi”)
  • Bizaram Az Dine Shoma (Women Life Freedom)

    • View all tracks by Saba →

    Credits

    Production & Engineering

    Writer
    daedaePIVOT, Daoud, Saba
    Producer
    daedaePIVOT, Daoud, Saba
    Acoustic Guitar
    Emanuel Townsend
    Additional Vocals
    Seanzy
    Lead Vocals
    Saba
    Mixing Engineer
    Matt Wheeler
    Violin
    Satya Jimenez
    READ MORE ABOUT SABA (4)READ MORE ABOUT SABA (4)
    READ MORE ABOUT SABA (4)READ MORE ABOUT SABA (4)

    No coverage available for Saba yet.