I've always been able to write rhymes and that would be like when you consult with your girl. When I'm mad and s - t like that I would throw headphones on and close my room door, when I'm mad I just close the door with my girl and f - k her. In so many different ways hip-hop has been like my girl and it's always been there to hold me down.

If you can perfect the booth, the stage and just your persona, like maybe in interviews and when people talk to you, then you're a full well-rounded emcee in my opinion.

I'm really, really, really, really conservative with money. I got to give myself a lot of excuses to spend money, because I come from nothin'.

You can have a phenomenal booth artist and he can get in there and be a technician in the booth and it won't translate on the stage. I think that's what makes emcees emcees. Some rapper dudes are great rappers but it don't translate on stage.

I don't hate any sort of music but I just think that the lyricism needs to be in the forefront.

Hip-hop definitely saved my life. Being able to write about the things I was doing, the things I was seein' and all that stuff, putting that on paper and coming into my own as Joell Ortiz. That's why I don't have a stage name, because I chose to talk about everything under the sun that happened to me or next to me in my music.

What inspired me as a child is the same thing that inspires me now: being nice. I always try to one up everybody with verses and be lyrical and just stand for the art.