But 'Cuban Linx' was a project that really needed to come, and I really wanted to get it off my chest because I know that the fans were really skeptical about it, like 'is this really gonna be what it's supposed to be?' So once everybody caught it for what it was and everybody was happy, that's mission accomplished for me.

I've never been the type of person to jump up and throw out the album without it being what it's supposed to be.

In the early 2000s, I was going through a lot. I didn't have my head screwed on right. Where I was at as a man, I was still growing up.

Ghost tells me every few years, Yo, you showed me this style ... I'm like, man, we the same style. At the end of the day, he's one of my favorite rappers, I'm one of his favorite rappers, and we just do it.

Sometimes you can make a substantial amount of money and automatically think that you've made it, that you did everything you wanted to do. Some people just stop.

Soul music has so many great artists who put their thing down. That's important.

We was just young guys who wanted to change. We got tired of doin' this same everyday bullshit that we was doin', and we all felt like we had dreams o' bein' a big star. You know, as far as with myself, I never really took it that serious as bein' a star. I only took it that serious as bein' a emcee, which is two different things. You know what I mean?