I've always been inspired by a lot of work coming out of the UK

I think art can really serve to inspire a movement - and, of course, it has in the past. The Civil Rights movement wouldn't have the same resonance without the songs from everyone from Pete Seeger to Odetta to James Brown.

What's wrong with hip-hop is the system that controls the definition of it. There needs to be more balance on the airwaves.

I think everything has its place. So if the ideas or the fluidity isn't coming in writing, maybe it's related to ingestions.

Your library teacher would say, "What happens to a generation that doesn't read the Classics?" Me, I'm not your library teacher. But I have some of the same questions and concerns, you know?

Jay Z and President Bush have a lot in common, that same brash confidence

Punk rock meditation, that's what keeps it going. That's how I let go, you know. It's exactly what I do, I blast it and run around crazy banging my head on the wall.