“I love the way I make hip-hop and I refuse to make pop-rap. I don’t refuse to make mainstream music, which is why I did a soul record. There was no reason why soul music couldn’t get played on the radio and I still wanted to have a relationship with my record label.”

And through doing that I realised that actually these stories were very visual in my head and I couldn’t wait to make the videos.

So, I really enjoyed doing the Strickland Banks album. But there’s no point in my trying to release underground hip-hop music on a major label. That part of my talent, or part of my art, had to live somewhere else and feature film was the perfect vehicle for it.

With hip-hop music, it allowed me to talk about political and social things but also to tell stories.

Anyone who puts 110% into their work deserves as much success as they can get.

I found very early on when I became a hip-hop artist that I loved telling stories. Actually, when I was trying to get a message across it was more powerful when I told a story, rather than if I used a metaphor or if I preached about an issue.

I was a soul singer first and I’d write love songs. I find with soul music it’s really hard to write about anything else. But I was 15 at the time when I was doing that and, to be honest, I’d never experienced love, so the words were kind of meaningless.

I didn’t make a film because I wanted a starring role. I made a film because I wanted to tell a story and I wanted to prove that I could direct.

The problem with working with a record label is they maybe a song I want to make a video for that they will refuse to make a video for because they don’t see that song as a single. And I found that very frustrating.

And the problem with the mainstream media is that it has these other biases that are much more important.

To ask whether the mainstream media has a conservative or liberal bias is like asking whether al-Qaida uses too much oil in their hummus. It’s – I think they might use too much oil in their hummus – but it’s the wrong question.

Does the mainstream media have a liberal bias? On a couple of things, maybe.

I mean, there is a part of the media that’s not the mainstream media. That’s Fox, that is ‘The Wall Street Journal’ editorial page.

Asking the question whether the mainstream media has a liberal or conservative bias is like asking whether al Qaeda uses too much oil in their hummus.

More than any previous time, people are drawn to meditation, to mindfulness, to yoga. These have become mainstream in the West because there is a hunger.

It’s every brand’s goal to be seen in the mainstream, and hip-hop music has become mainstream music.

Mainstream medias representation, or its guerrilla decontextualization, of black mens lives in particular can set the stage for erroneous assumptions capable of damaging an individual or a nation.