The goal is to make something that sounds new and different.

If the chemistry between me and the artist is good, then that's half the battle.

I have a hard time repeating myself.

I try not to become friends with musicians, but life happens and dinner happens and going out happens - it becomes interwoven in L.A.

I was never in the business of trying to put my name out there - I was really focused on music and records and being in the studio.

Hip-hop has never had boundaries - the more adventurous it is, the more popular it seems to be.

I was a snot-nosed teenage skater at one point, who listened to only punk records and hung around people that had that idea of what is okay to do and what isn't okay to do.