My thing is that I don't give no person that much power over my path that I'm walking. Not one person can make or break what I'm doing, except me or God.

My mom is American, so I was raised in her household in my formative years. But as I got older, my pops tried to keep me involved with the culture by telling me the stories of the conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea, how he came to America, and about our family back home, because all that side of my family, my aunties, grandparents, is in Africa.

When I became a man, and I started to understand the difference between the truth and what your parents are supposed to tell you, there's a difference, know what I mean?

If you don't know your full-throttle history, the whole story of how you came to where you are, it's kind of hard to put things together.

As gang members, as young dudes in the streets, especially in L.A., we're the effect of a situation. We didn't wake up and create our own mindstate and our environment; we adapted our survival instincts.

A lot of artists come into the game with a radio record, but they don't establish the fans as fans of their style of music. It's just that they're a fan of that song, and after that song plays out, it's real hard for 'em.

If it wasn't for the music bein' my outlet, I'd probably be hustlin', I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to go and get a nine-to-five, I never finished high school or none of that.