The story that I wanna tell is pretty much about the way I grew up. Being bi-racial, growing up in a big city and being an artist.

I'm so happy. I am able to see the world just by making music, just by doing the thing that I loved doing when I was five years old.

Me being in my grandmother's yard in Brooklyn. I must have been about 3. I had this red balloon. I let go of it, and it went up into the sky and just kept going and going. I completely flipped out, because I didn't understand why.

That's a big gift when people say to you that a song helped them or brought them to some place in their life where they needed to be.

Working with Gabby [Sidibe], I realized immediately that she was amazingly talented. I could tell just by the way she'd get into the role.

Don't take it so seriously.

I didn't really listen to rock 'n' roll until I moved to LA. We would ditch school, go get high, put on Zeppelin IV and just bug out.