Once you're signed to a label you compromise.

I gotta be dope first. I gotta be appealing to your senses, and to what you like first. Then the message happens. Then you relate to the message.

I see that happening with hip hop purists now. Where you have an artist like a Kendrick [Lamar] or a Drake, who are really trying different things emotionally, different things musically, and on a mainstream level. And you have underground hip hop fans dissing it, for the simple fact that it's mainstream - not because what they're doing is whack, or what they're doing is not sincere.

The way I see it, if people truly love my music, they will support me in some way down the road.

And you know, art as commerce, doesn't really make too much sense, they don't go together.

The materialism, the brashness, the misogyny - everything in hip-hop is amplified. Misogyny is a good example of something that is completely amplified in hip-hop. I do think there is more than enough of a balance, though, for fans who are willing to search it out.

I was kind of just too lazy to take my money out of the bank until I saw how Citi Bank responded to Occupy Wall Street.