Growing up on the streets of Birmingham   Where your home was pouring and your life was damned   I was a hungry black boy living with the world on my back   Billie was a white man's son living in a one room shack      And split those days in the Alabama heat   We shared what we had but we never have enough to eat   Mamma said it didn't look right, black just don't mix with white   But Billy was my friend and we swore one rainy night      To be blood brother   Lord, I loved him like no other   We were blood brother right to the end   To the end, well, well, well      Turned eighteen and we had no place to go   'Coz how long can you watch carnival   Billy said he got the money, put us on the first Greyhound bus   New York City lights gonna be greetin' us      Oh, the uptown life can cost you poverty   We're too amused but we suffered in dignity   Billy couldn't take nine to five, his soul can't stay alive   He said to me one day, we ain't gonna beat the crime      You're my blood brother   And I loved him like no other   We were blood brother right till the end   Well, well, well, yeah      So I watched him change as the days went by   And the money rolled in, we were livin' high   He didn't have to tell me he was breakin' the law   I knew it was him, the men was lookin' for      And the story goes that he caught a knife   And he pushed his luck and it cost his life   I sat down and I cried on that rainy night   When I heard heard it on the news   One [Incomprehensible] had died      We were blood brother   And I loved him like no other   He was my blood brother   And I loved him like no other      They were blood brother   And he loved him like no other   They were blood brother   And he loved him like no other