Empty Cart

This track was born from a real headline: The cascading effect of gas prices on grocery costs and the impossible choices facing parents at the supermarket checkout line. Muckraker's r&b production gives the story the weight of a front-page exclusive — journalism you can feel in your chest. Lines like "Used to fill it to the top, every Sunday after church," anchor the track in specifics that generic coverage misses. The mood — soulful, aching, tender vulnerability — reflects the emotional reality behind the numbers. Every Majik's Studio news track exists to make you feel the story, not just read it.

[verse 1] Used to fill it to the top, every Sunday after church, ground beef, frozen peas, the good bread, not the worst. Now I'm standing in the aisle at the Kroger on Vine, holding up two jars of peanut butter, doing math in my mind. The creamy one is four-nineteen, the store brand's three-oh-eight, but three-oh-eight times three kids means I'm putting something back late. Eggs went up a dollar since the ships stopped coming through, milk is almost six a gallon, what's a mama gonna do? I got a list of twenty items, money for thirteen, so I'm crossing off the apples, crossing off the tangerines. My baby girl wants strawberries, the ones in the plastic box, but strawberries are luxury now, like jewelry, like stocks. [chorus] Empty cart, heavy heart, putting back what we can't afford to start. Empty cart, heavy heart, the price of war is tearing us apart. [verse 2] Drive-through used to be our Friday, nuggets, fries, a shake, now the value meal's eleven dollars, more than I can take. So I'm boiling rice and beans again, the kids don't complain much, but I saw Jaylen hide his face at school, ashamed of bag lunch. Teacher sent a note home, said he gave his food away, said he told the other kids his mama packed too much today. That broke me at the kitchen table, tears on the formica top, my boy protecting me from knowing that our lives just dropped. Inflation's just a word they use on Bloomberg and the news, but here it's choosing which utilities I'm willing to lose. Water, lights, or internet so the kids can do their work, three things that should be simple, now they cut me like a dirk. [chorus] Empty cart, heavy heart, putting back what we can't afford to start. Empty cart, heavy heart, the price of war is tearing us apart. [bridge] I don't need a politician telling me to tighten up, I been tight since I was twenty-two, my belt ain't got enough. I need the cost of being alive to stop this upward climb, I need my children eating breakfast and I need it every time. They say be patient, say it's temporary, say the market will adjust, but patience on an empty stomach crumbles into dust. [chorus] Empty cart, heavy heart, putting back what we can't afford to start. Empty cart, heavy heart, the price of war is tearing us apart. [outro] Empty cart... heavy heart... we didn't start this fire but we're burning from the start.