If you want to be an artist, truly try to write what you believe, and if you write when you don't believe then you should try to become an actor.

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.

My mother went to university, my father didn't. But they are very educated, very wise people. My father went to the military, so he's worldly.

I'm a multi-tasker. I was down with that stuff before they invented the term.

Government and culture are two diametrically opposed forces - the one blinds and oppresses, the other uplifts and unites.

No matter what's in your head, you go up into any hospital, up to a terminal ward and it'll smack you right back into reality that, "Hey man, whatever you're dealing with, if it's heavy on your heart and head, you're gonna have to let that go, because there, some people are dealing with unavoidable situations that they can't let go." And then they eventually let those go, so, I mean, that's helpful.

I'm envious of the way that electronic dance music has organised itself. It has been able to understand what it ain't rather than what it is. And I think that slipped away from hip-hop as soon as the DJs lost the majority of the say so in the direction of the music.