⫘ PLAYLIST + VISUALS ⫘

[judgementcrime]

Come on, Buddy-boy, I'm due on the streets in ten minutes - I really don't want to go back out there with your blood on my knuckles.

• PLAYLIST •

COMA BABY // NICOLE DOLLANGANGER

Coma baby
The cry of your bones
And your skull when it split on the road

Lately I can't recognise you
The doctors lied when they said they saved you

LAUGHING WITH A MOUTH OF BLOOD // ST. VINCENT

Laughing with a mouth of blood
From a little spill I took
(Oh, what are you laughing at?)
And I can't see the future
But I know it's got big plans for me
(Oh what does it see?)

COPY OF A // NINE INCH NAILS

I am just a copy of a copy of a copy
Everything I say has come before
Assembled into something, into something, into something
I don't know for certain anymore

THE HAND THAT FEEDS // NINE INCH NAILS

You're keeping in step in the line
Got your chin held high and you feel just fine
'Cause you do what you're told
But inside your heart it is black and it's hollow and it's cold

Do you wanna change it?

NOT SO DENSE // DEER TICK

Have you ever felt a moment of aphasia?
Have you ever met your match at the apex?
You ever fall down so hard that everything shakes?

MY BODY IS A CAGE // ARCADE FIRE

I'm living in an age that calls darkness light
Though my language is dead
Still the shapes fill my head

I'm living in an age whose name I don't know
Though the fear keeps me moving
Still my heart beats so slow

LITTLE DARK AGE // MGMT

Breathing in the dark, lying on its side
The ruins of the day painted with a scar

And the more I straighten out, the less it wants to try
The feelings start to rot, one wink at a time

TERRIBLE LIE // NINE INCH NAILS

Why are you doing this to me?
Am I not living up to what I'm supposed to be?
Why am I seething with this animosity?

I'm on my hands and knees
I want so much to believe

PICTURING LOVE // JULY TALK

You, you...
'Cause I'm tired of seeing pictures on a screen
I'm tired of picturing love

FILTH AND SQUALOR // THE DEAR HUNTER

Somewhere there's a choice being made
For the mass by the will of a broken few
Guided by the hand of the guilty
Praised as the cure for a curse

And we were bound by need
To vicious villainy

SONG FOR JACOB // THE BRAVERY

They took all his money and all that he had
But he smiled with his eyes
And his face was bright red
And spit would run from his mouth when he said
I wanna live till I die

BEAST // NICO VEGA

Stand tall for the beast of America
Lay down like a naked dead body
Keep it real for the people workin' overtime
They can't stay living off the governments dime

We are free in the land of America

LITTLE MONSTER // ROYAL BLOOD

I've got love on my fingers
Lust on my tongue
You say you got nothing
So come out and get some

WORK, HUSTLE, KILL // ROB BAILEY & THE HUSTLE

All I do is work, hustle, kill
All I do is work, hustle, kill
All I do is work, hustle, kill
All I do is work, hustle, kill

I WANT IT ALL // ARMAGEDDON

You got what I want and I need it right now
Give it to me baby I don't care how
I got the world in my pocket and it's still not enough
I want it all and I want it right now

BEWARE // DEATH GRIPS

I close my hand and seize it
I clench my fist and beat it
I light my torch and burn it
I am the beast I worship

(beware, God is watching…)

TICK // DES ROCS

I feel like my whole life is counting down to something
I don't, I don't quite know what it is
And I, I feel somewhere between everything and nothing
But I, I don't really know where that is

PISTOLS AT DAWN // SEINABO SEY

Is that you reaching or you wanting to run?
Stand down or show down, baby, let's get this done

CALL THEM BROTHERS // REGINA SPEKTOR

That's it, it's split, it won't recover
Just frame the halves and call them brothers

THE CROOKED KIND // RADICAL FACE

I heard you telling lies
I heard you say you weren't born of our blood
I know we're the crooked kind
But you're crooked too, boy

INTRODUCTIONS

“Oh, no.” The Judge laughed, giving Strader’s hand an agonizing squeeze for luck, then letting it go. “Actually, my name’s Dredd.” He indicated the badge. “Judge Dredd, to the world at large. But you, Paulie...”

He smiled wider, showing his perfect teeth.

“...you can call me Rico.”

CHARGES

“What did they get you on, Rico?”

“They called it corruption.”

“It’s got to be more than that.”

One of the other guards said, “Sir, he killed a civilian. Cleared of murder, but guilty of manslaughter, accepting bribes, subverting the Law for personal gain, possession of illicit substances, abuse of his position—”

INTENSITY

Strader could see how Dredd was narrowing his focus in his body language. He was concentrating entirely on the girl now—she was the key to the situation. Strader couldn’t work out why Dredd was taking the approach he was, though. He took another step back, away from whatever was about to happen.

“Sure it is,” Dredd said, almost crooning, flashing another smile. “Come on, sweetheart. You think I don’t see that pistol you’ve got strapped to your shoulder?” The smile dropped, and Strader held his breath. “Here’s how it is,” Dredd said, very quietly. “You three are heading to the cubes. Nothing you can do about that. But there’s two ways you can do this. Easy or hard.”

ROUTINE

I knew what I was doing, and I was doing it well. A newly-paroled perp moved into the district, or a new gang, and I’d pay them a visit. It’s a process, really. Almost an algorithm. You arrive unannounced, kick in the door, take down whatever muscle they have, and make it clear that if they want to operate in the area then there’s a tax. And they play their part, too: they react with indignation and threats, you bust a few more heads—or even, if you really have to hammer home the point, you find the guy’s second-in-command and you put a slug inside his skull. That one usually makes them realise that you’re not messing around.

CHARGES

“I can use him, Chief.”

“I know you can. Just as I know that Rico can—and will—use you. And he’s a lot stronger-willed than you are. Trust me: fifteen minutes in his company and you’d be signing up to be his second-in-command. Now, is that everything?”

”FUN”

Rico laughed, sliding his boot knife out of its sheath on his ankle. Mooney gave a visible start, scrambling back. “Did you just pee yourself there, Buddy-boy? Can you tell when you do that? Does the bag inflate a little, or what?”

“D-d-don’t kill me,” Mooney pled, tears in his eyes. His twitch was going nineteen to the dozen, making him wink and smirk, as if he was being ironic about it. “Please. Ain’t you already done enough?”

Not nearly, Rico thought. There was a lot more fun to be squeezed out of a piece of human flotsam like Bud Mooney

CHARGES

The system—the Judges, the Mega-Cities, the whole damned circus show—was pure nonsense, straight from the head of some lunatic Grud playing loaded dice with the universe. Justice Department in particular—that was the blackest, filthiest joke Rico could ever imagine, a savage act of dark comedy imposed on a populace who’d never asked for it but didn’t know how to ask for anything else.

The party line was that the city was crazy, and that if the Judges relaxed their grip for a second, that craziness would spiral out of control—nobody seemed to be willing to admit that it already had, and the Department was the cherry on the top of the whole sick, sad sundae.

So of course Rico was corrupt. The law was corrupt—an ugly, festering mess that existed only to squeeze every last drop of dignity out of the people and kick the broken husks around a little for good measure.

And Rico Dredd was the law.

Better believe it.

UNPREDIC

How crazy was he, anyway? That was the thing about that guy: you could never really tell if he was crazy, or just faking it—to scare you, or get you to underestimate him.

NEGOTIATIONS

“Just show me the gun. You too, boys.”

Dredd’s voice was soft—softer than Strader would have believe that cracked-gravel larynx capable of. There was something wrong about all this—about the whole approach—but Strader couldn’t quite put his finger on it.

The girl blinked, those big black eyes suddenly seeming very large and vulnerable, not menacing at all. Then, hand shaking, she reached into her jacket, gently sprung the clasp on the holster, and very slowly—making sure not to point it at anyone—she drew the gun out.

Dredd shot her.

He moved so fast Strader didn’t realise what he was looking at at first. One minute, the Judge was standing, hands empty, quietly cajoling—the next, he was in a crouch, the gun in his hand, barrel smoking, and the girl was stumbling back a pace, the gun clutched in her hand and a dark red puncture wound right in the middle of her forehead. The back of her head was gone.

As the girl toppled back, the bright red of her blood staining the livid green of the plastic grass, Dredd aimed and fired twice more. The smaller of the two boys had time for a scream, shrill and hideously truncated.

And then Dredd slid the Lawgiver back into its boot holster, straightened up, and turned back to Strader. “You saw it,” he smiled. “Well, you were never here, but you get the point. They drew on me. I had no choice.”.

“You...” Strader swallowed hard, mouth dry. “You killed them.”

“Kill shot’s the safe shot, Paulie. That’s what they drum into you at the Academy.” He smiled, glancing over the cooling corpses. “Pretty good shot placement, don’t you think? Dead centre, head or heart—perfect as always, that’s what they used to say about me. Maybe I should go back to the Academy shooting range one of these days—don’t you think? Give the instructors a thrill.”

CHARISMA

But there was just... something about the guy. He had a kind of raw presence to him—the guy filled any room he walked into. He could even be Chief Judge one day, Mooney figured.

Y’know, if his head wasn’t so full of crazy it leaked.

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