I find it not just strange but almost ridiculous that people could take a song like the one I was doing and interpret it is corroding anything. Folks have the feeling that oftentimes if you don't talk about something it will go away.

Schedule? I have no schedule. There is no hurry. I work when I want to.

I find it not just strange but almost ridiculous that people could take a song like the one I was doing and interpret it is corroding anything. Folks have the feeling that oftentimes if you don't talk about something it will go away.

Paul Robeson once said that the artist has the responsibility to either help liberate the community or further oppress it. And I think that when Eldridge Cleaver wrote it down it was interpreted as his, but there's a history of people saying things of that nature and meaning it. And what I do is in that tradition, in that mode.

I work hard at it [delivery of lyrics], just like I worked hard at getting my masters degree. It's not just something I sit down and do. You have to learn and keep learning.

Colour is not the issue in America; class is.

You can have a poem like "B-Movie" and sum up thirty conversations that people have had on the subject, but I wrote it down, and other people didn't.