You go to any town, any city, any state in America and there's always a McDonald's. In a lot of places around the world, it's almost the same thing. And Nikki Giovanni was like, "Damn, where are we keeping all these cows?" And it made me think to myself, like, "Damn, where are we keeping all these cows?!" It makes me think that the beef we're eating isn't even close to being real. There can't even be enough cows in the whole world just to sustain the appetites of just Americans! I'll always remember that.
J. ColeI'm the same kid who used to hop the trains with headphones and just go to downtown Manhattan, walk around and listen to music or walk through the city. The fame restricts that. It's a small complaint in comparison to the benefits I get from it, but the restrictive part is what I don't like - and the fact that it's not reversible.
J. ColeFar from the richest rapper, but my biggest personal achievement thus far in my life has been retiring my mom early from her job at the Post Office. It's a tiny payback for the sacrifices she made that allowed me to chase a far-fetched dream of becoming a successful artist. I'm forever grateful.
J. ColeYou can't reverse fame. You can lose all the money, but you'll never lose people knowing you.
J. ColeWhen you're a rapper, just a rapper, you have to kind of settle for whatever comes your way - if a beat is hot, you wanna rap on it, period.
J. ColeIt's not necessarily a church theme and it's not really about church. I like my album themes to be metaphors because it gives me the freedom to speak about something else that's going on in my life, so the Born Sinner thing is not about church, it's not even about religion. It's using that as canvas to get other messages across and that's what the album will be.
J. Cole