There are situations where I'm uncomfortable saying, "I'm a hip-hop artist." In some circles, the response is like, "Oh, OK, so... you have whores and your ties are shiny?"

You've rarely got an artist that's not being chauffeured into the business by some huge-ass names.

Kids don't even realize what they're up against.

When new artists come out and they're not being cosigned or some company doesn't have a stake in it, or someone's not getting paid under the table to produce the whole record or bring it to video, the artist really suffers.

You have to understand the vehicle, the form that allows you to do what you do, and why that is.

There's a need for pop. There's a need for radio. There's also a need to understand the brilliance and the depth of jazz and soul - and what hip-hop can be at its most brilliant and what hip-hop can be at its most simplistic.

Unless somebody who's already eleven thousand times platinum is like, "We're ushering this project in," it's not really gonna pop commercially.