3:16
The Brooklyn Side, 1994
Written by Brian Henneman
This roots rocker, built around a steady, pounding beat and a repeated, primitive guitar riff, is written from the point of view of a small-town police officer eager to hand out tickets. The opening salvo of the lyrics tells us right off that the lines are delivered with irony, if not contempt: "Straight from twelfth grade into junior college / Buddy, buddy, buddy, I passed my exam / They're making me a law enforcement person / Got me a gun and a badge, I'm a man." The town's sheriff and mayor are delighted that the "new pulse gun" is going to pay for things like stoplights, especially if the town is a speed trap ("50 down to 30, man oh man"). Fun fact: Rush Limbaugh used the riff on his execrable radio show, demonstrating once again that irony is lost on the conservative. Was he aware that a Rockets song on the this same album, "Welfare Music," described him as an "angry fat man on the radio"? Probably not.