I never really told anybody that I'm a rapper. I wasn't walking around being like, "Yo, check out my mixtape!" It was more of a secret grind.

Barack Obama would not be President if he were dark skin. You know what I mean? That's just the truth. I might not be as successful as I am now if I was dark skin.

Anything I do, I want to do it well.

I had a lot of resistance, and not just to fame. I was always conscious of not changing.

If I'm a character, it's a biographical movie. My character is as close to me as possible. As close to being myself as possible. So my character, J. Cole, is very close to Jermaine Cole.

I didn't even have to be a big fan of someone to enjoy hearing them speak. I remember when Nikki Giovanni came - I wasn't really familiar with her. But she said some things I'll never forget. Like, okay, for example, she was talking about the amount of beef that's in the world. There are so many McDonald's, Burger Kings, Wendy's.

Touring is very routine. You get to the city, you go to the hotel, you got to be at the hotel by a certain time - it's very routine. I'm not a very structured person, so when I get some structure, it's cool; it's good for me.