Kind of the critical acclaim of this movie [La La Land] is that it's striking a chord with the public in a way that has been really beautiful and powerful.

In my neighborhood in Springfield, Ohio, there were a lot of young kids. We all played tackle football after school, but I knew very early on that I was not an athlete.

There's a certain confidence that comes with being sure about the way the world works.

We want to do things that are interesting, great storytelling, some of it is gonna be more fun and funny, some of it is more serious and talking about interesting issues that we think are provocative and interesting to us. Kind of on a more political level. But, you know, just things that we find interesting that we think stories that need to be told.

Women are dealing with the same thing: they're dealing with expectations about how they're supposed to look and how they're supposed to interact with men. I think we're all trying to figure it all out, especially when we're teenagers, but I think the key is to listen and empathize with one another.

There are more black men incarcerated today than there were slaves in 1850.

I think the most important thing is that I'm making music that the people enjoy. So the fans, the people that are out there listening to music and consuming music, I want them to enjoy it and love it. And so that's more important to me than Grammys.