I talk about life, and I make universal music with an American style - and that's what I do.

I want to hear the artist. I want to hear them give me something that I can relate to, other than the fact that everything's about bragging.

There's always going to be space for battle in hip hop. For competition. It's just an inseparable part of the game.

I want you to know who I am: what the streets taste like, feel like, smell like. What the cops talk like, walk like, think like. What crackheads do - I wanted you to smell it, feel it. It was important to me that I told the story that way because I thought that it wouldn't be told if I didn't tell it.

I think hip hop allows us to talk about everything, and Africa is what I choose to talk about now. If people are not talking about Africa, that's them, that's cool, there's nothing wrong with that. But this is who I am, this is what I have to say, this is what I have to offer.

When your so focused on what people say, how can your really be focused on the music? If you're concerned with what someone says, you aren't working on a real record. You're working on something that's just for now, to please people this very second... because you don't believe in yourself.

And the stuff that I write, is even tougher than dykes.