I don't sing melodically. Rhyme pattern is how I sing. I also write like a lyricist or an MC because that's what I was before I was a singer. I just took those elements and put them into music.
I don't have one song that sounds like another one in my entire catalog.
I love being an entertainer - not really fond of being a celebrity.
I'm a performance artist first; I'm a recording artist second.
Being honest is my job. That's what music is for me.
No one chooses to raise children alone.
Man, I don't want to have nothing to do with computers. I don't want the government in my business.
I'll dabble here and there in different forms of the art, but the label has me locked down like a slave so, of course, I'll be doing albums during this time.
I started performing at two or three on a tape recorder, one of those little flat recorders where you just push play and record.
I knew it would happen. I knew I'd be No. 1. I'm a new artist; I don't know the rules. Nobody told me it wouldn't happen.
I have a master plan as an artist. I've always said I'm not going to be punching nobody's clock. I will work as an artist to survive in this world.
Anything that had to do with art I been doing all my life. It was a gift. It's nothing I work real hard at doing.
I don't read music or anything, so when I produce, I go basically by ear.
I'm not satisfied with the explanations I get from tv or from school.
It's almost like a lot of black people in America, a lot of young black men, are born with this cloud over their heads. It's their penitentiary cloud, this philosophy we all have, that it's harder for us.
The kind of music or the kind of arrangements that I do, the kind of musicians I choose, is just what I like to hear.
What makes me furious, not just because we're in an interview, but I don't like when writers take your words and put them somewhere else, in the wrong context in their own article about you.
I love putting the music together. It's like art.
Hip-hop is the people. What the people are moving toward is what hip-hop is. I think people are moving toward a freer way of thinking. Openness.
I've been a vegetarian since I was 19.
I don't have any particular thing I do ritualistically. I do the same thing every day. I get up. Drink a lot of water. Have a wheatgrass shot. Drink some green juice. Eat as healthy as I can.
I've had two children. I've had three boyfriends. I've had a lot of things happen that can change your opinions and values and philosophies.
I grew up listening to old soul.
I am not systematic at all when it comes to religion. I just love life. And I'm not judgmental. And I'm a vegetarian.
From then on, I realized this is what I want to do, what I'm supposed to do: Giving energy and receiving it back through applause. I love it. That's my world. I love it. I enjoy it. I live for it.
But now I realize that this record business really needs me. No one else is trying to take a chance or do something different.
I grew up with all mothers, all women. I come from a long line of matriarchs, very strong women.
Hopefully my music is medicine, some type of antidote for something or some kind of explanation or just to feel good.
I believed in myself, and I've always worked very, very hard as an artist, and I am an artist in every sense of the word.
I consider my musical ability to be a gift from the Creator. It's not that I try to work hard or nothing like that, it's a gift, it was given to me, and I appreciate it.
