I find any great man, black or white, I'm going to study him, learn him so he can't be great to me no more.

There's no way I could pay you back but my plan is to show you that I understand, you are appreciated

The thing that bothers me is that it seems like all the sensitive stuff I write just goes unnoticed . . . the media doesn't get who I am at all. Or maybe they just can't accept it. It doesn't fit into those negative stories they like to write. I'm the kind of guy who is moved by a song like Don McLean's "Vincent," that one about Van Gogh. The lyric on that song is so touching. That's how I want to make my songs feel. Take "Dear Mama" - I aimed that one straight for my homies' heartstrings.

It's not like I idolize this one guy Machiavelli. I idolize that type of thinking where you do whatever's gonna make you achieve your goal.

I put the pistol by my head, and say a prayer. I see visions of me dead, Lord are you there?

I heard a rumor I died, Murdered in cold blood dramatized, Pictures of me in my final state, You know mama cried, But that was fiction, Some coward got the story twisted, Like I no longer existed, Mysteriously missin', I'm known worldwide baby, I ain't hard to find.

It's no longer a fad to be down for the young Black male. Everybody wants to go past. Like the gangster stuff, it just got exploited.