I don't ever want anyone to hear my music and look at it as just gratuitous violence, or hustling and money-getting - I try to tell the perspective of the woman, the man, the mind, why.

Coming up, you [got new] sneakers and you had to run outside to make sure everyone saw. It was on display. That's just part of Hip Hop culture, part of the competitive spirit of Hip Hop. This is not new, I don't believe it's new.

The energy in working with my team at Adidas is really good for me. Being this is the third installment, I feel like everybody is comfortable with everybody.

Fashion right now, people are so...everything is driven by the aesthetic.

I was going through a time where I was like man I wanted all of my clothes to be totally understated and I would do pop color with hats from a line called Ale et Ange out of New york City. They created all these hats and I just thought they were super fresh and the only way that I could really get them across...I was just like, 'Let me make everything mute and just put on the hat.'

When I think back to my influences and icons musically, they were my icons musically because, for example, I would look at Rakim and be like man he said the freshest things and then I look at him and he would have on the pair of Nikes that I wanted and I'm like, "ma' please!" It was everything. Now, I sort of feel like if you are fresh then your music doesn't have to be that good because people are so keyed into the fashion. That's just the times I guess.

Sitting with the woman of your dreams and forgetting what her name is.