I had been through, of course, the divorce and I had been hit with some taxes that really showed me to be careful who's working with you and your money, and you have to be the one that is responsible for your money - you can't trust anyone and I did and I ran into a problem.

All on the street, you get treated like a street cat: "All right, you've been eatin' enough, you're fat, get out of the way now and let somebody else come by."

The big stars in rap, they were too big, so when my rap generation started, it was about bringing you inside my apartment. It wasn't about being a rap star; it was about anything other than.

Some people work hard to be something that they're not, and I don't work at all, I'm just me. And that can bother anybody I'm not working nearly as hard as the other guys, and they don't like it.

Act your age don't pretend to be older than you are give yourself time to grow

Hip-hop ain't died because of the South, that's retarded. When I named the album originally, I thought I bit off more than I could chew but you'd be an idiot to think I'm talking about how the South killed hip-hop or how New York isn't where it should be or where it once was. It was like, "Damn, I need to explain this?" But I thought, "Nah, the proof is right there. We should know what it is." I expect the hip-hop audience to be avant garde. I want them to be where I'm at or beyond where I'm at.

I've gone through too much, from beefs to divorce to my mom passing which I always expressed in my music, so there's not album that sticks out as more important than the other to me.