Well now Billy Voltaire was a piano player up from Miami way

He used to play in the bars, he could sound like the stars

Ladies would pay and pay, one night he did wind up playin' in Havana town

Nobody knew, least Billy Voltaire that these were his final sounds 'Cause he met up with Meritta

A dancer in from the coast

Half woman, half child, she's drove him half wild

He loved that lady the most One night he did find her

In the arms of Shrimper Dan

So he pulled a knife, took poor Danny's life

And then he turned his own cold hand It's just a Cuban crime of passion, messy and old fashioned

Yeah that's what the papers did say

It's just a Cuban crime of passion, anjejo and knives a slashin'

Yeah but that's what the people like to read about

Up in America, up in America Well now they never found Meritta, some people say she got ill

Billy Voltaire had no one to claim him, he was buried on Pauper's Hill

And no one talks about 'em no more, it happened just a week ago

But people get by and people get high in the tropics they come and they go It's just a Cuban crime of passion, messy and old fashioned

Yeah that's what the papers did say

It's just a Cuban crime of passion, anjejo and knives a slashin'

But that's what the people like to read about

Up in America, up in America