You should be a person inside the world with knowledge of your terrain. And if you lock yourself into the 2,000-by-3,000-square-mile, lower-48 box of the United States, you're going to be frustrated by its limitations. You gotta think outside the box.

I don't think a lot of people have been privy to understanding that there's this talent in hip-hop all over the earth that's just as good. It's just that everything out of the U.S. proclaims to be the best, especially L.A. and New York, being that they're the nerve centers and media capitals of the most predominantly media-emitting country in the world.

It ain't this big I, little You. Music is to be shared. Music is not a hustle. [Hip hop's become] cultural stripmining [by the major labels]. Some people get into this music to make a killing but music is a way to make a living.

I think hip hop should be a living word. And what I mean by the living word is like yo, you gotta have the words that provide life.

Never have so many men treated women like our foes. They call 'em hoes, but they might as well call them foes, 'cause you are totally against the existence of somebody who should live their life as an equal human being. If not, any man knows, it's like we're not equal. You know, women are usually a little better than us.

Some artists are told what to like and told definitions of what the music business is. That's a problem. Music is artistry, and you want your music heard, your act known. But artists don't know. They are ignorant the minute they sign a contract.

I'm not a firm believer of "mo' money mo' problems" - I think that's stupid. I think it's that problems are already there that can be exacerbated by more things you don't understand.