A lot of people heard about gin and juice for the first time from Snoop Dogg, but it was nothing new in rap music, and it was nothing new in the black community.

I think there's something your hormones do that makes a chemical change in the way you think.

I had no idea how much the stuff I was doing was affecting people outside Oakland. At the time, also, hip hop wasn't able to tour because all these clubs that let hip hop come in now, they would never have let hip hop come in.

A lot of us don’t get a sense of our personal power. I know the vast difference that one person can make in changing things.

I wanted to write a song about sexism, but I didn't want to do it in a mechanical way and be like, "Don't be sexist!" because that's not how I talk in regular life.

What I'm trying to do is make music that people relate to, that talks about ideas that are personal but also make that connection to trying to make revolutionary change, and I don't need to change my music to get to a certain audience.

All of a sudden it became that hip hop didn't used to be about partying; hip hop used to be about putting out a message.