The posters hanging on my wall
If you don’t like it, leave!
The band carrying on like a free-for-all
If you don’t like it, leave!
The singers and bands that I like to hear
If you don’t like it, leave!
My wild curly hair and beard
If you don’t like it, leave!
So you don’t know what you came in for
And you can’t take what I got in store
I’ll always be happy to show you the door
If you don’t like it, leave!
The cloud of smoke hanging in the air
If you don’t like it, leave!
The non-style of clothes that I like to wear
If you don’t like it, leave!
The blasting volume on the stereo
If you don’t like it, leave!
The movies playing on the video
If you don’t like it, leave!
So you can’t take what I’m all about
My nasty habits make you wanna shout
You don’t like it, you can always get out
If you don’t like it, leave!
The kind of food and the way I eat
If you don’t like it, leave!
The words I say and the way I speak
If you don’t like it, leave!
The type of girls that I love to date
If you don’t like it, leave!
The type of guys that I love to hate
If you don’t like it, leave!
I didn’t get into this business to be respectable
I never said my manners were impeccable
From your point of view consider it rejectable
If you don’t like it—oh no
If you don’t like it—oh yeah
If you don’t like it—oy vey
If you don’t like it, leave!
©2002 The Hesh Inc./Reality Shock Music
This was totally my attitude when I was 17, living in a yeshiva dorm room in Jerusalem, away from home. Just about every item listed in the song existed in the room. And the sentiment in the song's title and "response" line was genuine, actually spoken to a dorm-mate after he had taken it upon himself to criticize what he didn't like while sitting in my room and listening to the music I had on the boombox, which he also presumably didn't like. (He saw that I was serious, and he changed his tune on a dime.) I wrote the verses the following year, as I looked back on what had been my glorious senior year in high school.
Some eight years later I introduced the song to the band I had started up on the Jersey Shore. At first we played it Ramones style, four-on-the-floor rhythm and chugging guitars. But when it came time to record, we slowed it down and funked it up (complete with "Match Game"-style wah-wah clavinet). Released on the REALITY SHOCK album There's A Voice in 2002.
Listen to the song here: