As much as we think we are as artists, we think, oh, you know, we're going to do this, we're going to do that, and really at the end of the day it's the fans that make that determination. Because if they don't buy it, stream it, share it or talk about it, then you're just a crazy person with an idea.

Everything that we experience every day leaves a long-lasting impression.

When you start trying to figure out what you're the best at, that's when you become delusional because you start to believe that. [you're the best] I'd rather continue to ride that mule than to ride the cocky horse. You see people spin out of control like that all the time. Those are the most tragic stories – the most gifted people who start to believe that it's really ALL THEM. It's not all you. It can't be all you. Just like you need air to fly a kite. It's not the KITE – it's the AIR.

Usually as humans and especially as a man, we look at things in context. It's like, oh, I know what that is, that's this, or this, there's that.

More than anything, I wanted to make sure that everybody was a pusher of difference. And they had to be able to do it in a communicative way, not esoterically. Because there are a lot of people who push things forward but sometimes only you and two people out of 500 in the room get it, but you want somebody who has mastered their craft so well that an 8-year-old gets it just like an 80-year-old gets it. They get the same visceral feeling.

The odds are so stacked against you to have a music career in a place where there's virtually no music industry. So I always attribute it to God.

Some of the best art occurs when people are oppressed. That's just what we do as a species when something shakes us up.