I'm not saying my teachers should have rapped my lessons or anything, but I feel if I had made more of a connection to them I would have gotten more out of school.

When I was born, my momma pussy had the new car smell.

The Lord givith and the Lord takith away. I was given a lot of signs from the universe and looking at it in retrospect made me feel like God was telling me I needed to follow my dream. My granny getting in that car accident and being at that hospital when I was going there to see my girl... that whole part of the story where I go to the show and come back to the hospital... and it was almost like as soon as I found out that my granny didn't make it as soon as I got back, I also found out that my son had just come out.

I think it's helped me evolve all around, as an artist and as a person. I think we need something, need something to believe in. We need something that makes us pay attention to these humbling experiences.

I was probably just graduating high school, maybe still in high school. When I was still in high school, maybe the last two years, I was rapping but I wasn't telling anybody. When I signed my deal people didn't know it was the same Ryan Montgomery from Oak Park High School, because I used to play basketball and I used to fight. Like I'd bring boxing gloves to school. So when they found out, it was, "You mean Ryan who be boxing?" or, "Ryan who be hopping up at the park?" So I was known as that guy.

My dad struggled with cocaine addiction, and we actually went to rehab with him too. I remember having extensive talks with him about how I was wired a certain way, how I wouldn't be able to drink and do drugs the same way my friends got to.

I'd clash with my dad over other things, you know, like difference of opinion and me getting testosterone, you know what I'm saying? Me feeling like I'm a little tough, being a teenager. But my big brother would come in drunk and really, really try my dad and I didn't want to do that.