Hip-hop reflects the truth, and the problem is that hip-hop exposes a lot of the negative truth that society tries to conceal. It's a platform where we could offer information, but it's also an escape.

My craziest ideas come from cartoons. I approach music by taking that cartoon extreme and the real life extreme and finding somewhere in the middle. The animated element lures people in, but the real-life substance puts the nail in the coffin.

I feel like I introduce another level of my creative ability on every album.

I'm trying to set up opportunities for myself so that I don't only have one outlet to go through and rely upon as far as a support system financially, emotionally and mentally.

I will be so glad to take the picture and pose and look good for the picture. But when you catch me while I'm looking real sideways and the picture's ugly as hell, I don't want you to have the picture like that!

I wanted to make something that reminded people of the way albums used to feel. I wanted something as good as the stuff put out by the Bomb Squad, or Dr. Dre and his production crew, or 'A Tribe Called Quest.' I miss albums like those.

Got demons on both shoulders.