You know, if I can survive marching band, I can survive anything.

My mom. She really encouraged me. That's the trouble with education: Unless you have a really supportive parent, you get left behind.

You have to reflect honestly what's around you in your music. I think a lot of people are just obsessed with their own relationships, so that is an honest reflection of what they see. A lot of people don't go much deeper than that.

In terms of content, a lot of rap is crap, with all the sexism and homophobic bullshit. It's incredible how rappers are always preaching nonconformity - you know, "I'm just gonna go my own way and be my own man and blah blah blah" - but they're the first ones to do so many things that they have to do. They have to do that hip-hop thing, a certain way of walking, and it's so conformist.

I was approaching adolescence. For some reason, I guess my mother thought it would be less crazy out in the suburbs, which it wasn't. I just think adolescence is hard for anyone.

What people generally tell you is, "We'll all agree," and then once you sign, they expect to get their own way. I think it was a bit of a surprise that I was still very headstrong even after signing. I wasn't so happy to get a deal that I would agree to anything. In fact, I disagreed on most things and got my way on most things, which I think was to all of our benefit. But they wanted the record to come out, and I wanted the record to come out, so we had to work together.

I feel like you should always be questioning the genre you're doing. If you're doing something that sounds like a lullaby, it can be good to make it about someone stalking someone.