“I’ve always felt like I was observing everything, like I’m just looking out of the window, peeping how everybody is living and just penning about it, so I made the album about that concept.”

I know when it comes to the actual narrative of my solo music, it’s its own thing. That’s why I went out of my way after ‘Crew’ to not do a bunch of collaborations.

I feel you gotta be nervous. If you’re nervous, it’s just ’cause you want to do well, it’s not ’cause you’re scared.

I’ll listen to certain things that I made back then, and I’m like, ‘I wish I could have done this, I would’ve done that’. When you start out making music, you just want to make something that people will like.

Being old didn’t seem like an accomplishment. Everyone I knew who was old was like sick or broke. It just didn’t look appealing until I moved to L.A. and started interacting with people who were 50+ and still kicking it, having money, living large.

I started off making beats when I was like 12. Then when I linked with people who make beats full time, I was like, ‘Bet, now I can focus on writing and singing.’

I was reading Neil Postman’s ‘Amusing Ourselves to Death’. It’s one of my favourites.

Me and Goldlink have known of each other for a minute and our managers know each other so they set up a studio session. When we got in the studio, we was cool; we’re from the same area so we have a lot in common.

In order for people to take what you say seriously, they have to know who you are as a person.

Before anything, I wanted to be a rapper. I used to make beats and I would start singing to layer my beats and that’s kind of how I realized I could sing.

I feel like any way you can get the message to resonate, I’m all for it.

I still got bars, I just use ’em differently. I’d say I’m a better singer than I am a rapper at this point because I’ve been sharpening my sword.

Music is my one opportunity to let out how I’m feeling when I’m not talking to a chick or my mom, you know what I mean? It’s just venting.

There’s the hype stuff that people love for five minutes and then there’s the stuff that changes cultures and shifts how you look at music. And then there’s that rare point where that hype stuff changes the game.

You work on something for so long that you become numb to it. Like, you don’t even know how to listen to it because you listened to it so many times.

You gotta question the purpose you serve for those who invite themselves into your life. Learn who you are and always question the motive. No one knows you the way you do.

I don’t wake up thinking about the genre of R&B as a whole. I just make music.

The album was rejected by Arista, not surprisingly, and we then renegotiated our deal for the future and the next album,

The Dark Side of the Moon is a fine album with a textural and conceptual richness that not only invites, but demands involvement.

If you are not going to produce albums then you are not going to produce new fans. It’s impossible.

And we use it to read album reviews and watch kitten videos… not to put those two things in the same light!

I think every album you have, especially if it’s done well, you feel like you’re competing with yourself.

I’ve always wanted to make a bluegrass album.

My mother kept asking me, “When are you going to do a gospel album?” And I’ve always wanted to do a gospel album.

I’m free to do what I please, I’m probably not going to do albums. Just because I think releasing tracks as singles is a better way for me to stay topical.