If I don't channel pain into a song, I play my guitar or play the piano or play my drums, or go swimming.

I visit studios. Just to get the feel, the smell, and see what other people are doing. Not only listening to the radio, but going to studios, greeting musicians and artists, just getting a vibe.

Social justice has always been a part of my inspiration. For example, when the Vietnam War was going on, I wrote a song about that.

It's important for me to go back into the ghetto, where I'm from. I still get my oxygen from there. I don't live in the ghetto but every time I go back, I'm seeing the same things that I lived. That's one of the things I mean when I say, "My feet back onto the ground."

I had the global outlook that I really wanted to capture the world. I would like the attention of the world at least and I wanted that.

My role is the shepherd's role. The shepherd is the one who opens the gate and allows the flock to go through and whoever opens the gate has to close it, and the gate is not yet closed.

Good thinking brings good feeling and good feeling brings good thinking.