Hip-hop educated me about other forms of music, because it sampled from all different styles.

Hip-hop educated me about other forms of music, because it sampled from all different styles.

I continue to write songs that are topically related to social, political and economic issues of our time, but I also recognize that onstage, I have a lot of fun and audiences have a lot of fun, so I'm trying to package the messages in music and sounds that are fun to perform and fun to listen to.

Compassion can change a lot of things, including the world. Young people especially need to know that, because they're the future.

We live in an era of consumerism and it's all about desire-based consumerism and it has nothing to do with things we actually need.

Music, especially as an adolescent, helps to build identity because that's when people start developing a sense of self. You can kind of tell based on what music a person listens to what kind of person they'll be pretty much for the rest of their life.

When I started out, I wrote the songs, recorded the songs, mastered, mixed, did the artwork, made the packaging and did the distribution, all myself. Now I understand what everyone's jobs are, who is doing them right, and who isn't.