“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.”

Rapping was kind of hard. It’s so many words. When you sing you can kind of stretch the words out. I didn’t have to write as much as everybody else.

My music is often written from the perspective of an extroverted introvert.

If it feels good coming out, then I really don’t care about anything else, for real. It’s all about just having fun with it. If it feels like less work, then the project is coming out better.

If I feel like making something, if I feel like saying something on the track, that’s what I am going to do – regardless of reaction.

I used to think that there was a certain way I had to stick to when it came to R&B, but now I’m saying whatever, the same way these rappers do. I’m bringing that into R&B music.

I don’t really feel the loyalty to any particular genre. To be completely honest, I’m an R&B singer because I’m black and I sing.

I work while I’m on the move, so I’m able to book sessions in different cities.

If you can look in the mirror and say I love myself, that’s going to affect your interactions with people who look like you.

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 really just wanted to make something special for women. There aren’t enough records uplifting them out there.

I think it’s good that YouTube decided that they really want to showcase Black talent.

An outside party don’t ever stay outside.

If you tell somebody that you make music they’re all interested. But when you say you rap, they just start rolling their eyes at you. It would’ve taken me a lot longer to get my foot in the door if I’d continued rapping all the way.

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.

Don’t become a slave to technology – manage your phone, don’t let it manage you.

Don’t become a slave to technology – manage your phone, don’t let it manage you.

I want to live the rest of my life, however long or short, with as much sweetness as I can decently manage, loving all the people I love, and doing as much as I can of the work I still have to do.

Racism does not have a good track record. It’s been tried out for a long time and you’d think by now we’d want to put an end to it instead of putting it under new management.

The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it.

Days are expensive. When you spend a day you have one less day to spend. So make sure you spend each one wisely.

In the long run managements stressing accounting appearance over economic substance usually achieve little of either.

I’ve actually not read any books on time management.