I don't feel like I need to preach to the world or nothing like that. I just feel like I share what I say, and if listeners get it, they get it. And I never underestimate the audience's ability to feel me.

My style is a little masculine, and what I loved about Pyer Moss was how well he can make a blazer, the looseness of those pants, or color palette that he chooses from season to season.

Different periods, different cultures - it's just the way my mind works. My music is that way as well. There's a foundation but the inspiration comes from everywhere. I've been influenced by so many things.

I have the ability to sing with emotion and feeling, but if you say I sound like Billie Holiday, that's cool. Let's look at who Billie was: she was this person, this singer, this beautiful diva who could move the audience with the slightest gesture of her hand.

I'm pretty mutable as a human being.

Society has a problem with female nudity when it is not . . . ”—Badu pauses to get her words together; she wants this point to be very clear—“. . . when it is not packaged for the consumption of male entertainment. Then it becomes confusing.

I don't read music or anything, so when I produce, I go basically by ear.