Every time you ask yourself where hip-hop's going, ask yourself where you're going; how are you doing?

There was a time when hip-hop was its own musical principle, aside from sampling. Like the entire Wild Style break is instrumental. Kurtis Blow's earliest stuff was studio musicians playing. Whodini had a real clear sound, things like "five minutes of funk," stuff that you could write really beautiful, lush string and horn arrangements around, stuff that was just music.

I'm trying to get low. People's personalities can get in the way of their own work.

Hip-hop is rock & roll. What the hell is Wu-Tang but Motorhead?

And remember don't high post when you're far from home, and high posting when you're all alone.

The moment you start thinking it's hopeless, then it is. [But], if you think it's gonna get better, it really does. Life is a test.

I'm doing exactly what I was supposed to do. Yeah. I didn't exactly choose this. My own life, if it were up to me, would be very, very quiet. I'd be like a shopkeeper, a book collector, or something like that. I'm not like this. Myself as a performer and an artist is totally different from who I am.