I try to mix the fashion with the music and what's going on at the time...at the time [when my uniform was black on black] I was putting together an album, my album was my name at the time; very minimal, very stripped down, very everything but it still had and have to have some level of pop.

I can't say that music ever made me do anything.

To me it's just the knock, man. It's the knock and the groove of the beat. When I start a song, it's the first thought. It's the first thought and the first cadence, because that's the most natural. You know what I'm saying? I feel like people can feel when something is natural.

I feel like people can feel when something is natural. I think they can tell.

Hip-hop to me right now is really easy listening. It's very easy listening, like there's nothing abrasive about it. There's no album that I put in my car that makes me roll down the windows - all the windows - and ride past the club line three times before I get out the car.

As a writer, you have a huge ego. You think that every line means something to everybody the same way it means to you. And that's not true.

I talk specifically to the lifestyle and those who can relate to it. And I feel like, where the creativity comes in, is where you draw the parallels that everybody can relate to. That's where it's creative for me. I feel like it works best that way.